Days of our Youth
by otahotian
Summary: 1st in the Blue Line. "Alert. Object M is frowning." "Roger that. Switch the red lights on. This is bad." "Ultimate mission for today: Make Object M Smile." The path of shinobi can be hard. But it can be fun, too. Iruka-centric fiction from years after Kyuubi attack.
1. Chapter 1

**Small story about our favourite shinobis short time after the Kyuubi-attack**.

**The characters are: Team 4 - Morino Ibiki with Hayatte Gekkou and Umino Iruka**  
><strong>Team 2 - Inuzuka Hana with Hagane Kotetsu and Mizuki and Kamizuki Izumo<strong>  
><strong>and Mitarashi Anko - all 'kids' as lately genin or early chuunin<strong>  
><strong>Hatake Kakashi, Namiashi Raido, Shiranui Genma, Maito Gai - as early jounin<br>Uchiha Itachi as chuunin  
>Uchiha Sasuke, Uzumaki Naruto - as little kids<strong>

**place: Konoha  
>time: three years after Kyuubi atack<br>mood: playfull  
>song: ((I was writing it while being on drrr high, so..)) Durarara OST basically<br>disclaimer: I don't own the character, BUT! I own the ideas, the fallen tree and their friendship and I plan to take advantage of it, and become the God of the New World.  
><strong>

**I am sorry for mistakes, if you spot something what is hurting your eyes, please let me know and I will immediately correct it.**

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><p>It was chilly Wednesday morning and Iruka Umino, tall brown-haired teen, was running late to his genin's team meeting. Next to him was jogging his best friend, and in that moment his only teammate, Hayate Gekkou. He was late, too, of course, but he didn't seem to mind. He was just happily munching on an apple he had stolen from Iruka and his light shoes didn't make a sound on the fresh grass.<p>

Yes, Hayate was fast and silent, while Iruka was loud and strong and breathing heavily as he was trying to keep up with his smaller teammate.

"How come.." Iruka panted "...you are so.. fast.. the ..fist thing.. in the .. morning..?" he asked between breaths. They were nearing their meeting place now. The path they knew by hearts, so the fallen tree laying across the way wasn't much of a surprise. Hayate lightly jumped behind it without so much of an effort unlike Iruka, who had to quicken up to have enough energy in his legs to jump on top of it.

"I am not. You are just too slow." chuckled Hayate and threw the core on his friend. Iruka easily dodged, but almost slipped on a moss while doing so.

"Am .. not." Iruka pouted on the laughing teen and quickened up again, so they would be able to run the last few meters towards their sensei side-by-side.

They could already see the masculine frame of their sensei as he was standing there leaning against a tree.

"Alert. Object M is frowning." whispered Hayate while they slowed down to faster walk. Iruka evened his breathing before answering:

"Roger that. Switch the red lights on. This is bad."

"Yes sir, red lights switched on." Hayate nodded.

Iruka smirked next to him before whispering: "Ultimate mission for today: Make Object M Smile." he declared and Hayate failed in suppressing his chuckling.

"Aye aye, General – we haven't thought it out enough. That's mission impossible!"

Their sensei upon seeing them took few steps from his tree and hid the kunai he had been using to clean his nails to pass time.

"Brats." he grunted for greeting. "Late." he added and sternly frowned, looking at them sharply.

"We know and we are terribly sorry, Ibiki-sama." said Iruka for them both, while Hayate decided to stay silent and wait for the storm to pass. "We overslept."

Ibiki Morino, the strictest and scariest head of the Interrogation department in the whole history of Konoha, raised his eyebrow – something he learned can make even the most resistant criminal talk like old gossiping woman, but obviously didn't have any effect at all on his two genin-brats – and asked:

"Both?"

Iruka scratched back of his head in nervous and defenseless gesture and Hayate shrugged.

"I was sleeping by Iruka's.." he explained.

Ibiki nodded. "I see. Alright. Mission for brats." he said and handed them small sealed scroll with blue "D" on it. Iruka made disgusted face before taking it.

"Do mission, find me, report, go home, shower, eat and sleep, brat. You have circles under your eyes so large I could use them instead of shuriken." Ibiki ordered before petting lightly Iruka's head. Iruka made a move to snatch his hand away but Ibiki quickly dodged, expecting this move.

"Not fair!" Iruka declared and waved with his arms to make a point. "His circles are darker _and_ larger and he doesn't need to!" he pointed to Hayate who was discreetly making faces on him.

Ibiki sighed. He _knew_ that Iruka said it just to have something to argue about. "No arguing. Just do what I said, and I will not ask why you weren't sleeping enough." he grunted.

_Because he was screaming and kicking from nightmares and then being awake to not dream again, and crying his soul out when he thought I wasn't awake, _added Hayate to himself, but didn't say anything.

"Yes, sir!" Iruka shouted and mockingly saluted. "But the reason I didn't sleep was because Haya-_chan_ snores!" he pointed accusing finger at his blinking friend.

"That's not true!" Hayate shouted taken aback and blushing, because Ibiki was giving him weird look and it was embarrassing. "I don't snore! And don't call me 'chan' am not girl!"

"But you are _small _and _cute_ and _shy _and _polite _and _fast _like cherries with milk! And you _do_ snore, you just don't know, because you don't hear yourself, since you are sleeping trough it." Iruka stuck his tongue out and crossed his eyes and Hayate harshly poked him under ribs.

"Shut up, _fish-cake_." Hayate frowned.

"That's pretty lame, _Haya-chan_. I should teach you better insults." Iruka laughed and got himself another painful stuck to his stomach.

"Stop it, brats. You have mission to do." Ibiki said mildly. He had already gotten used to they playful bickering by the time. He got them when Iruka was eleven and Hayate twelve and that was almost three years ago.

"Yes sir!" Iruka shouted again and they tried their best to form two-person's line in front of their sensei. In moments like this, they could have really used third teammate.

"Alright, now go!" Ibiki motioned for them to go towards the town and both of them turned around running along the way.

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><p>"What is in the scroll?" asked Hayate while jogging backwards.<p>

"You read it." said his teammate and threw him the scroll. Hayate raised his eyebrow, something he unintentionally learned from their teacher.

"Why me? You got it, you should read it."

Iruka smiled at him evilly. "I can't read!" he sang with innocent expression. Hayate shrugged.

"I thought so." he said seriously holding back his laugh. He started unsealing the scroll and slowed down to wait for his teammate.

"It says: 'Your genin team is to clean the streets of 9th district and rub the graffiti out of the back wall of the Academy.' Pretty boring if you ask me.."

"I don't ask you. I know that." Iruka grinned and easily dodged another poke. "Let's do it fast, ne?" he shrugged.

"Like you say.. Like you say." Hayate agreed and they started walking towards the Academy, because if the scroll said they should start with the streets, of course they would do it all the other way around.

After all, they _were _Ibiki's brats.

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><p><strong>I plan on making the chapters short, but more frequent. However I don't promise steady update, I will do my best, though.<strong>

**Thank you for reading. If you liked it, give me feedback, I will cherish it until I get down from the high. Reviews make athor's day.  
><strong>


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter two. Enjoy.**

**By the way (666bulle) thank you very much :) 42 - there is a film/book "Hitchhiker's guide to the Galaxy". If you have two hours and want to have small laugh, watch it, it's worth it. I won't tell you anything more, I don't want to spoil the fun for you. :)  
><strong>

**Anyway, I always wanted to write a fairytaile beggining with a sentence: "Somewhere, in the middle of nowhere, there was something, that have nothing to do with anything."**

**Still listening to the same music. Still being on drrr high.  
><strong>

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><p>2<p>

They finished their task in a record time of three and half hours and laid down on a road in the middle of District Nine, not caring that people were giving them weird looks. They were exhausted.

"Aw.. in times like this, I wish we had the third one.." Hayate moaned and shielded his eyes form sun with his wrist.

"Nah.. I don't want anyone else. Like this I have you just for myself!" Iruka grinned teasing his friend, who just rolled his eyes on him before realizing that it didn't have the wanted effect because he had had his face covered.

"Idiot." he said instead. "You still have to share with Ibiki-sama and my dad and sisters and my cat and aunt and uncle and.." he would continue on, not being for Iruka who interrupted him with mock-panicked gasp:

"What? I thought the cat was _ours_!" he said, because the two of them found the kitten on their way from training and adopted it and let it live with Iruka, since Hayate's father thought Hayate was allergic to animal hair. He probably was, but he couldn't care less, since he was allergic to almost everything. "Does that mean you don't want to be with me and bring our little one up together anymore?" he declared dramatically and sat up, looking sneakily around to see that about twenty citizens were looking at them with scandalous expressions.

Hayate seemed to realize it, too, and promptly turned red. He was easy to embarrass and Iruka was often using it to make fun of him. Like in that moment.

The older teen stood up pulling his friend on his feet, too. "We are finished here." he said in obvious attempt to disappear from the area.

Iruka sighed. He was actually enjoying himself and the idea of having to go to sleep was not appealing at all.

"Let's go to bed." Hayate declared loud enough for every citizen to hear him just to humor his friend and play along. Iruka turned around to look at him, noticing the still present redness on the teen's cheeks and started freely laughing. Hayate hesitantly joined him and soon enough they were both howling in laugh while walking down the deserted streets of mid-day's Konoha.

"Hey, if those punks aren't our famous Izu-Mizu-Ko!" said suddenly Iruka and elbowed his friend turning his attention to four small figures near the Konoha river.

"What? Where?" Hayate looked the pointed way and his face brightened up upon seeing them, too. "Yep, you're right!" he cheered and waved with both of his arms, hoping to get their attention.

One of the figures turned around and seemed like checking them, before poking another one and pointing their way.

Iruka with Hayate changed their way along the river instead of the road to the Konoha square, watching as two tiny figures started jumping up and down while waving wildly. They waved them back and started grinning in almost identical way.

"What about we throw them to the river?" whispered Hayate and chuckled as the two figures started running towards them, slowly followed by the other two.

"I think it wouldn't have the effect, I guess they are both already wet.." Iruka pouted. "But!" he said suddenly making his friend look at him with interest.

Iruka grinned at him in evil manner and firmly gripped his shoulders and waist. "I can always throw there _you_!" he chuckled and made a half-step with turning, effectively showing his friend to the water.

"Irukaaaa!" Hayate shouted before going under the water with a loud splash.

Iruka didn't even have time to laugh, before two pairs of hands gripped him and he just heard cheeky "hi" from Kotetsu and shy "hallo" from their youngest friend Izumo, and he went flying after Hayate.

The small teen was just trying to catch his breath when something hit the water next to him and made him sink back down. He panicked and caught the first thing he found, trying to get back above the water. Unfortunately the thing he caught on was his generally violent teammate, so he went back down immediately.

He was waving frantically around, because he _really_ didn't like water, and he _really_ didn't enjoy being under it, and he _really, really_ couldn't breath and he didn't want to die.

And then there was something pulling him up and fresh air was cold and chilly, but he leaned back against the warm something what pulled him from underwater and was kind of content.

"Hey, you alright?" something poked him and he realized it was Iruka who pulled him out, because no one else he knew was so warm, and yet so irritating.

Hayate nodded. Wait, why was Iruka in the water? Wasn't he the one who threw him there _from the land_ in the first place? Wait, wait. Wasn't Iruka the one who threw him there?

The small teen turned around in Iruka's embrace and punched him with all he had. He _really _hated water.

"Bastard." he mumbled while Iruka tried his best not to let them both sink back and rub his aching jaw at the same time.

"Heh. Sorry, I couldn't resist.." the larger teen chuckled hesitantly and started pulling them both towards the land. "Let's get us out, it's still cold to bath."

"Whose fault is it, that we are _bathing_, again?" Hayate stated coldly and started making his own effort of swimming, without getting too far from the source of warmth in the process.

"Well. _Mine_, that _you_ are bathing. _Their_, that _I_ am bathing. So you are now officially avenged." Iruka informed him with small smile.

"Oh.. I see.." So, _that _was how Iruka got to the water, too.

They were fortunately close to the bank, so it didn't take them long before they climbed up to join their two grinning friends.

"Sooo.." Kotetsu started while messing up Hayate's hair. "How was the bath, kiddos?" he had on his special cheeky grin.

"Nice actually, thank you for sharing, as I see you have had your own one earlier." Iruka chuckled pointing to their bare torsos and wet t-shirts, they were holding. He took off his own top, hesitantly followed by his teammate.

"We had a mission to pick up the trash from the water today. It was so exciting." spoke up Izumo, the smallest teen from group, and offered them smile.

"We had our own share of excitement. Imagine, we were _cleaning _the Academy walls." Hayate informed with a grin.

"Actually, it _was_ kind of interesting." Iruka laughed. "Some of the pictures were pretty educational."

"Ew.." reacted Hayate remembering some of the sketches.

Izumo silently laughed – he could fortunately only imagine, what Iruka considers 'educational'.

"Hey, there is sensei! And Mizumizu is soo slow." Kotetsu suddenly declared, and really, the two figures was close to them finally.

Iruka waved on them smiling happily and Mizuki hesitantly answered with his own wave.

They had been good friends at the academy, best actually, but after both of them got their own teams, they grew apart. It was mostly Mizuki who distanced himself.

Iruka was, _after all_, Ibiki's student.

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><p><strong>Questions, comments? :) <strong>

**Anyway, thank you for reading.  
><strong>


	3. Chapter 3

**Third part. I am actually enjoying this more than I thought I would :)**

**Anyway, still the same, if you spot some mistake which hurts your eyes or language sences, let me know so I can correct it, thank you.**

**By the way, this is still happening at the same day as the two previous chapters. **

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><p>Iruka walked down the streets on his own. He still had his smile on, but he was already starting to feel lonely. Without his friends, ever-polite Hayate, energetic Kotetsu, shy Izumo and moody Mizuki, he was just a small child, child who lost his family to Kyuubi.<p>

He sighed. There was no use to being all depressed on top of being so tired.

Iruka yawned and rubbed his eyes absently greeting young women who was passing him – she was from the same part of Konoha as him. She didn't greet him back and Iruka remembered he had pranked her few weeks ago.

He chuckled to himself remembering that he had woken up to her scream the morning after. The prank wasn't really sophisticated or anything, he had just put her under small genjutsu, making her think she had gone bald.

She hadn't spoke to him since then and he didn't really mind. She was irritating.

"Gossips.." the teen mumbled to himself while he unlocked his door with a gentle push of chakra – it was his hobby, traps and their mechanisms – and suddenly had that really weird feeling at the back of his head.

Iruka harshly turned around, someone was watching him. He was fast enough just to see some dark blur disappear behind a corner, but the person's chakra presence was still there, he could faintly feel it.

The problem was – he didn't recognize the pattern. At first he though that maybe Hayate had gone after him to see if he was really going to bed, or that those two idiots had been trying to prank him or something. But the chakra was absolutely unknown to him.

"Hiding behind a corner.. huh?" he spoke to himself before shrugging and entering his house. He would find out later, the follower didn't look like going away, anyway.

Iruka had more important things to do. Like sleep.

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><p>"Aaw.. what to do, what to do.." Kotetsu said once again and ducked before anyone – probably Hayate – had the chance to hit him.<p>

"You were asking the same last twenty minutes." Izumo said in a tone somewhere between boredom and irritation.

"I know that, my dearest little friend!" Kotetsu exclaimed and Hayate got the distance feeling, that it's the same what Iruka would tell him, being it the two in this situation. It scared him every time, how similar were those two. "I was just waiting for my dearest brother in everything _but_ blood to answer!" he added with a cheeky grin.

"Kotetsu.." Hayate sighed. "Iruka is at home. Sleeping. He won't answer your question."

Kotetsu pouted. "But _he _is always the one to start our ritual arguing about what to do!"

Hayate sighed again. "It's always just the two of you, who is arguing. However, that doesn't by all that is saint to me change the fact, that Iruka is at _home_. Sleeping, and he won't bloody answer your stupid _question_, no matter how often you are asking."

"Oh." Kotetsu said intelligently with a distance feeling, that he should probably teach Hayate how to swear properly.

"What about we go up?" asked suddenly Izumo trying to stop their arguing before it even started.

"I guess it's better than standing here." Mizuki smiled and nodded.

"I am in." sighed Hayate and stood back before Kotetsu could flung his arm around his shoulders how he always did to him or Izumo, when he was going to say something cheeky.

"Aalright! Let's go! I bet Minato-sama is already missing our graceful presence!"

"Jeez.. You are even larger idiot than Iruka."

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><p>Iruka sat down on his bad and stretched. His whole body hurt. He listened to the cracking of his joints with satisfaction.<p>

"Alright!" he said to himself after he finished. "Time to see my loyal follower!" he grinned and stood next to his window moving the curtains just a bit to see and not to be seen, and looked out. He searched the corner, but didn't see anything, or anyone suspicious.

"Oh right. It moved." he mumbled again, his voice sounded weirdly in the deserted house. He searched for the chakra presence and detected it in a narrow isle closer to his house.

He could actually see the shadow of his follower, as the guy wasn't probably concerned about being found.

"Hey... It's a child.." Iruka muttered. The shinobi following him was about the same high as Hayate was, but not as lean and graceful, he moved to crouch down on the dirty land and Iruka realized, that the kid was _small._ Not in the way Haya and Izu were, the kid was probably larger then the two, but while crouching he was embracing his body and he looked really tiny like that, in almost fatal position.

Iruka thought for a moment about kids from his class, but he didn't think this boy had been his classmate. He would recognize his chakra pattern.

For a moment he thought if that isn't _him._ But _he _was now probably at home with _his _mom learning how to bake cookies. And Iruka would have recognized _his_ chakra immediately. _His_ and Hayate's he would recognize anywhere, after all.

Iruka decided to give up for a moment and moved the curtains back to their respective places, returning to his loving bed.

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><p>"Hey look!" Kotetsu said, jumping two feet up while pointing towards group of older teens. "If these aren't our honored jounin." he said loud enough for everyone to hear and laughed mockingly.<p>

"Stop it, Ko.." Izumo warned him. He didn't really want to get to fight with the olders, _again._

"Let's go.." Mizuki added and started pulling the bouncing Kotetsu towards Hokage Monument, but it was probably too late. The tallest from the group had left his friends and was now going straight towards them.

Yes, that guy was smiling, but they all knew, that the jounin would all probably smile the most when killing someone slowly and painfully. They were all insane, after all.

"Hey, kids." the tall jounin greeted them pleasantly and Izumo gulped. The guy was twice his high.

"Ugh.. hi?" Hayate said questioningly. It was weird to have one off the 'high and mighty' to talk to them.

"Whatcha want?" asked Kotetsu with an arrogant smirk not looking nervous at all. The jounin raised an eyebrow on him, obviously debating if the kid was sane or not. He then looked at the small group in front of him with a frown.

"Iruka's not with you?" he asked the one kid, who looked like the most reliable from them, unfortunately picking up Mizuki. The white haired genin just grunted something not caring about the jounin at all.

"He's not. He went .. home." Hayate said when he realized the jounin didn't look dangerous at all. Just lost, maybe. It probably wouldn't hurt to say where his friend was, since no one, but Hayate and Izumo, would probably be able to find his house anyway.

"Oh. I see.. Thank you." the jounin said shrugging and Hayate suddenly remembered that Iruka once told him, that he made friends with one of the jounin, claiming that the one was absolutely _normal _and _sane_.

"Hey," Hayate spoke up to the leaving jounin. He turned around looking questioningly. "Wouldn't you be Namiashi Raido?" Hayate asked and the jounin smiled, nodding.

"Yea.. That's old me."

"Nice to finally meet you." Hayate grinned. "Iruka told me you are the only sane jounin in the Konoha."

"He did, didn't he." Namiashi Raido laughed rubbing back of his head. "I wanted to ask him if you kids wouldn't want to play a game of Flags against us, but since he's not here.." Raido shrugged.

"Tomorrow!" Kotetsu said with a huge smile. "We will play against you tomorrow, is that alright?"

Raido gave them raised thumb and made his way back to the other jounin, waving on the kids.

"So.. Shall we go visit Minato-sama?" Mizuki asked with a smile matching his friends.

Tomorrow they are going to play against the jounin.

And, Hayate promised to himself, they will do their best.

They were, _after all_, Ibiki's soldiers.

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><p><strong>Thank you for reading :)<br>**

**Please tell me what you think,  
><strong>

**can anyone guess who is the one following Iruka? It shouldn't be so difficult. He know them, that's for sure. :)**


	4. Chapter 4

**I am happy you tried the guessing, it's first time for me trying to ask the readers something concerning the story, so I am really happy it actually earned me an answer. :) Thank you.**

**Anyway. Don't worry, it's not Itachi-kun. I think at the time he is like nine years old and he is more concerned about his studies and family, than about Konoha genin. It's not either Kakashi - the idea didn't even pop in my head, though it would have been really interesting.**

**This chapter is more serious, I wasn't trying to write it like that or anything, it just happened.. This story is already messing with my head, taking the direactions _it _wants, and not the ones I would like for it to take. Does it make sense?**

**Anyway, enjoy.  
><strong>

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><p>4<p>

Iruka woke up to silence, which scared him. Most of the time he was waking to his alarm-clock going all crazy, or to his own screaming, so the absence of anything _loud_ and _irritating_ was confusing.

He took a deep breath to calm himself and looked around to see if there was anything suspicious, but didn't find anything. His alarm-clock had '5:57' on it, so Iruka told himself he can as well get up.

"Honestly, waking up three minutes before my alarm-clock is weird." he murmured to himself, his voice strangely hollow in the large silence of his family house.

He would do it often, talk to himself, because the silence in the house, which was always so loud and bright and happy when his mother had been there, was slowly getting on his nerves.

He stood up walking in his sweat pants towards bathroom, taking a towel on his way.

"Good morning, Kaa-chan, Tou-san." he mumbled while passing his parent's bedroom.

He lazily brushed his teeth and hair and pulled it up in a ponytail. He checked in a mirror his eyes, just to see that the circles had only grown larger after the fourteen hours of sleep, as he had suspected.

"Damn. Ibi-sama won't be happy.." he mumbled again and took a look around to see if he can find something to mask them. Deciding he can as well get a help from his mum he exited the bathroom dumping the wet towel over the edge of bathtub to let it dry.

He knocked on the door to his parent's bedroom.

"Kaa-chan, Tou-san, I am coming in." he said softly and entered the large room.

The room was sunny, even so early in the morning. It's windows were towards south, so even the earliest and latest sun rays could enter. Iruka would always spend a lot of time there, with his mother, just sitting there on the floor and bathing in the sun. They would talk and laugh together, while Iruka's father would sit close to them, somewhere the sun wasn't so bright, and watch them with content smile, or try to read a book.

The books were still there. Some of them on shells and one laying on the floor, open, because his father had been reading at the time Hokage had called emergency. All of them were covered in dust, because Iruka didn't have it in himself to change it there, or actually anywhere else in the house, but his bedroom. Dust was everywhere in the house, he had cleaned just bathroom and kitchen, and it always made him sneeze.

He looked down on the floor, where there were three paths of footsteps, and started walking precisely in one of his old ones.

"I will just borrow something, Kaa-chan. Sorry if I woke you up." he apologized softly taking few steps towards his mother's bed, where was her little table with mirror and few cosmetic things she had used sometimes.

"You can still sleep, Kaa-chan. It's too early." He picked up small box with light dust – powder. He hoped the color will match his skin. His mother was paler then him, but not too much.

"Tou-san hasn't come yet, I guess he has a lot of work to do these days." Iruka continued with his ramblings in a deserted bedroom while pushing two fingers inside of the powder looking curiously on them.

"I will just make something to breakfast and leave it on the table, 'k?" he said with a sad smile touching the darkened skin under his eyes, applying the powder over it.

"So, I will just go, now. Bye, Kaa-chan. I will be back in the afternoon, maybe later, we have some plans with Haya-kun." he lied softly and turned to return back to the doorway.

In the middle of his track he froze and looked back on the bed with alarmed expression.

"I-I-I would .. kiss you, Kaa-chan.." he whispered and his voice broke. "But I wasn't feeling well in the morning." he lied. "And I didn't want you to catch it, too.." He blinked pushing back the tears that threatened to fall and ran from the room, carefully not to make any more footsteps on the dust-covered floor, and slammed the door shut after himself.

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><p>Hayate ran out of his front door waving back on his father and took a direction towards training field number 9 where their team meetings took place.<p>

He was late.

Again.

He pushed chakra to his feet to speed up, because he had only few minutes before he would have to be there. It didn't take long for him to reach the forest and he saw a jogging figure of his friend – who else would be there at that time, after all – so he smirked and disappeared into the dark forest, finding his path trough.

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><p>Iruka looked around to look if he would be able to see someone, because the feeling of someone watching him was back, and stronger. He didn't even bother to look for the chakra signature anymore, he didn't know it.<p>

And as suddenly as the feeling of being watched appeared, Iruka caught a silent echo of footsteps against shallow forest ground. It was so silent he at first thought he was imagining things, but then when he concentrated on that direction, he caught oh so silent breathing and light thumps of movement.

He briskly took out of his pouch three shuriken and without second thought threw them towards the person following him, noting with satisfaction the slight change in steps and breathing.

He heard his shuriken make a contact with an unfortunate tree and stump and nodded to himself. _The person dodged. Good._

Iruka made a seal with his hand letting the bomb on the second shuriken detonate grinning wildly when he saw the cloud of smoke and dust and heard frantic footsteps from the place.

He frowned when he realized that the person tailing him was now taking direction straight towards him. _Does he want to pick up fight, or something? Or is he disoriented by the cloud?_

The teen quickly ducked low at the edge of forest hiding himself in a shadow trying to remember what his friend Hayate told him about sneaking and hiding. Something about calming his breath, which was difficult since Iruka was breathing fast from the excitement, about hiding in the shadow, which was even harder since it was bright day and he didn't really want to go deeper into the forest, and trying to think like the enemy.

_Like _hell_ I am going to think as a creepy stalker.._ he thought to himself and instead concentrated on the sounds from where his enemy was coming. He heard the footsteps getting closer and closer, accompanied by evened breathing and silent hissing.

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><p><em>Idiot. Idiot. Idiot! Idiot! IDIOT! <em>Hayate was screaming inside his head, not daring to make any sound in case Iruka would be listening. He really didn't want any other shuriken aiming on his head, thank you very much.

_What was the idiot thinking anyway? Throwing shuriken around like this. If Hayate wasn't so fast, he would have gotten hit with it, and Kami knows what poisons they were covered in!_

He could see the light of a path already, and sighed in relief. Oh sweet safety. He took a look around, but didn't see his hot-headed friend anywhere.

"Iruka.." he said silently, knowing that if his friend was listening he would hear him.

He searched for a spiritual pressure and felt it from behind him. Hayate turned around quickly trying to find his friend. He thought he caught a blur of motion about sixty meters from himself, but then the forest went back still.

_When did he get behind me? _The dark-haired teen wondered taking few steps backwards. There had been something weird about the aura which had resonated from the blur back there.

Hayate frowned. _I shouldn't be scared of my own teammate.._ he thought to himself, but there were shivers running down his spine. The aura was scary. And those shuriken _were_ aimed to stop and kill.

"Iruka..?" he said again questioningly and little bit louder.

"H-Hayate?" there was soft, but loud voice from the direction of the pathway and the teen turned around confused. There was a person standing, looking alert, but it was definitely his teammate.

"Yea. Wait there, I am coming." he said harshly before sparing another look back to the forest, where he had seen something moving. He didn't see anything.

He sighed in relief. It was some animal, and he had mistook it for a person, because he was still slightly dazed by the smoke he had breathed in.

* * *

><p>Iruka stood there trying to even his panicked breathing. It was Hayate. He had almost <em>killed<em> his best friend. He didn't, fortunately, but it was a close call.

He clenched and unclenched his fists painfully digging his nails into the soft flesh of palms while watching his friend gracefully jog through the rest of the forest towards him. Iruka was sweating and looking at him with wide, panicked eyes. He had almost killed him.

"You look like shit." was Hayate's greeting from where he stood in front of his best friend. "And is that _make up_?" he asked with disgust pointing towards Iruka's eyes. Iruka didn't even snatch his hand away, like he normally would.

The older teen titled his head to look at his teammate more carefully. "Are you alright?"

Iruka let out small sobbing noise and took a step forward embracing his little friend tightly. "I almost killed you.." he whispered.

"But you didn't. It's alright." Hayate whispered back, being already used to his friend sometimes needing help with calming down. "Why were you throwing it so seriously, anyway?" he asked frowning.

"I thought you were someone else.." Iruka answered finally letting him free. Hayate needed to breath.

"Who else?" he asked warily demanding and answer. His friend just shook his head:

"I will tell you later, we are late." he laughed sheepishly, but there wasn't his hearth in it.

* * *

><p>Ibiki was pissed. It was now official. His brats, who were now standing in front of him with a nervous expressions, were late. Again. Second day in a row.<p>

"So.." he started giving them his scariest look. They didn't look affected. "Any good reason you are late _again,_ or should I directly ask you your last wish?" he growled crossing his arms.

"Well.." Iruka started scratching his head and trying to make an eye contact with his teammate. Ibiki raised and eyebrow.

"Ah.. I wanted to surprise him so I took a path trough the forest, but I got lost.." Hayate lied as best as he could, trying his best to look embarrassed.

"I don't believe you." Ibiki said shaking his head. Was the brat serious? He knew that Hayate had a bad sense of orientation, but to get lost on the way _inside _of Konoha?

"I am sorry, Ibiki-sama." Hayate said in the most pitiful tone he could muster looking down on his shoes. Ibiki sighed.

"Be more careful next time. And don't be late tomorrow." he warned them, and although they didn't like the idea of lying to their sensei, they weren't that keen of the idea of painful death, either.

"And don't call me 'sama'!" Ibiki suddenly remembered and shouted on them angrily. The two teens exchanged amused look and earned themselves a smack over their heads. "Why can't you just call me 'sensei' like every sane student?" he said angrily.

"Because we aren't sane?" Iruka tried innocently and got himself another hit.

"Because we aren't students?" was Hayates guess which got him the same reply as Iruka's.

"Because you like us?" Iruka got a hit and growl.

"Because we like you?" Hayate asked sweetly and dodged the hit aiming on his head. His head already hurt, damn it!

"Just shut up and go train or something." Ibiki said in a low voice waving them of. "Take a round around the field and then spar." he ordered and went to sat down at a tree. He took out from his cloak some papers he needed to work at and watched his two brats running side-by-side their lap.

He had to say, there were good. They worked well as a team, maybe because there were just the two of them, after that incident.

And while he always tried to be angry on them and give them his scary look, he knew they had grew on him.

They were his genin, after all.

* * *

><p><strong>Anyone wants to try and guess the stalker's identity once again? Still a little time to get it right. :)<br>**

**Oh, I will give you a hint: they are a genin now, probably little older than Iruka (well, I don't think that will actually help since the ranks here are from my head) and in the anime they are a jounin from the very beginning**. **However, they aren't in the anime very often, which is probably a shame, altough they are crazy, I kinda like them. :)**

**Thank you for reading, it makes me happy that someone likes something i thought up :)**


	5. Chapter 5

**Well. Damn. I realized I got kinda obsessed with the story - would explain why I am uploading other chapter at - wait up - exactly _1:53_ am. Oh, second reason would probably be, that it made me laugh really hard when I noticed that Neko 404-san reviewed at such a godly hour of three am or something. Really made me laugh, don't ask me why, though.**

**Oh, and well, the secret is spilled, well done Ruon Jian, well done.**

**And thirdly - i soo miss my Aikido lessons, so I kinda sorta made Haya-kun use some techniques, i think it suits him, he is small and fast.**

**And lastly, enjoy :)**

* * *

><p>5<p>

Iruka stopped to halt in the middle of training grounds, getting ready to fight. In front of him his friend did the same and they stood there just looking at each other's eyes, waiting for the fight to begin.

Ibiki peeked up on them and smiled. They both had gone a long path.

"Begin." he said mildly, when it looked like they would stay there motionless for a long time, and Hayate ran towards him while Iruka, expecting that move, leaped left and down and kicked his lower legs.

Hayate almost lost his balance, but moved his weigh on his arms, turning around and jumping back on his feet in a fluid motion.

They weren't close to each other to attack without weapon, so both of them started making small sidesteps, circling in the middle of training field.

This time it was Iruka to make a move and he lunged towards his friend, just to be caught by his raised arm. Hayate moved to the side so he would have Iruka at a better angel and ducked leading the other teen by his arm over his back and speeding his fall.

Iruka felt flat on his back with a laud thump as he harshly hit the ground with his palm just before his back could touch it to make his fall less painful. He took the opportunity of Hayate standing above him and made a scissoring motion with his legs, once again hitting his friend's knees making him took a step back to steady himself.

The larger teen rolled on the dirt and jumped up moving quickly towards Hayate and aiming his leg on his head. Hayate dodged and made his own attempt of punching his sparring partner.

Iruka, not a person to dodge attack, caught his wrist and pulled on it roughly hitting Hayate's body against his own. In the blur of motion he turned him locking his arm behind his back and trying to catch Hayate's other arm to restrain him from moving.

Hayate crouched and made his arm free while moving it – with Iruka's – over his head. He caught Iruka's other one, too, precisely how his teammate had been planning just a moment before. Hayate moved to stand next to him and pulled one of Iruka's hand closer to himself and the other one down so that they were crossing each other, not unlike the number ten, in front of Iruka's stomach.

He made a graceful step forth forcing Iruka to go down unless he wanted to have his bones broken. Hayate didn't let him fall freely, instead choosing the option of leading him to the ground, turning him on his stomach and locking both of his arms in a lever.

"Heh. I give up." Iruka chuckled from under him and Hayate smiled cheekily before letting him go. "You really got better."

"I wish I could say the same to you.." Hayate teased and helped his friend stand up.

Iruka rolled his eyes and took out of his pouch two kunai – making sure those two didn't have any poison or anesthetic on their blades – motioning for Hayate to do the same.

They stood facing each other, preparing for other fight to begin. Iruka was smiling his usual hungry grin and Hayate placed unemotional mask on his face.

Ibiki looked down to his papers when he heard a loud crash, signalizing they had started. He had still a lot of work to do.

* * *

><p>"We are finished for today." Ibiki informed and both of his genin stopped death in their position, interrupting their fight. They bowed to each other and Hayate shielded his katana, laying it down on the grass. Iruka hid his weapons – shuriken and kunai mainly – to his pouch.<p>

"You two can do whatever you want. And don't be late tomorrow!" Ibiki ordered before walking away. He had to go back to office and find the rest of his papers.

"So.. who was the 'someone else' you were talking about?" asked Hayate laying down on the grass next to his sword and patted the ground for Iruka to join him.

"Well.." Iruka sighed and leaned on his elbow so he would have a better look at his friend. "Yesterday I noticed someone was tailing me. When I was going home." He watched his friend's forehead crunch in a frown. "I took a look and saw someone, just a shadow, some kid. He staid in front of my house for few hours before disappearing, so I thought it was him, again."

"Ah.. I see." Hayate mumbled to himself. _Damn. Damn. The movement in the forest. _He remembered the blur and the chakra he felt earlier.

"But I think he has already left. I haven't felt him since yesterday, so.." Iruka mumbled and laid on his back watching the bright blue sky. He really loved sun.

_Not a chance._ Hayate told himself. The chakra was scary, though. He shouldn't leave Iruka alone, who knows what would the stalker do. "I guess.." he said out laud.

They laid in a silence listening to each others breathing. Iruka closed his eyes making his hearing sharper – he could hear the silent movement of water from the river and the thumping of wings and silent footsteps of animal around.

"Hey. I just remembered!" Hayate said loudly and Iruka almost jumped up – he was so focused on the silent noises, that the voice of his teammate made his ears hurt. Hayate probably noticed, because he smiled sheepishly and petted his head in silent apology.

"What is it?" Iruka mumbled not even bothering to open his eyes.

"We met the jounin of yours, yesterday." Hayate grinned and Iruka raised his eyebrow.

"Raido-san?"

"Yup. Anyway, he wanted us to play flag against him." Iruka leaned up finally watching his friend.

"What?" he blinked. "Him against us? Us – like the two of us, or the whole group? And he is playing alone?"

Hayate burst out laughing. His friend could be an idiot sometimes. "Us – like the whole group and no, he isn't playing against us alone, but with his friends."

"Oh." Iruka said. "That means us five against the jounin right.." when Hayate nodded Iruka continued, "that means – Raido-san with Shiranui Genma, Sarutobi-san and Kurenai-san and probably Maito Gai."

Iruka scratched his chin. "That means it's five to five, but they are older, so we would have to recruit someone else – genin, preferably, because we won't want to spoil the rank teams – or think up some reeeaaally good strategy."

"I would say: both. Or else we are screwed." Hayate laughed. He didn't really care if they would win, or loose. They would do their best, so that Ibiki-sama could be proud of them.

"Let's go find the pest.. eh, I mean: rest!" Hayate said sheepishly and pulled his friend up. He took his katana and realized, he forgot to give it to Ibiki – he would always let his sensei take it, because he didn't really want to walk around town with it in his hands. He shrugged. He can as well use it in the game..

It wasn't against rules to use weapons, and even if it was, he – and Iruka, too – probably wouldn't care.

They were, after all, Ibiki's worst nightmare.

* * *

><p><strong>Well. It's mainly about fight, so nothing really funny or anything. I think the story shouldn't really be put under 'humor' category, anymore, what'cha think? And I was thinking about changing the rating to 'T' because of the curse words, but - i think that kids know even more dirty words than I do, so I won't really do so..<br>**

**Hope you liked it. And good night for me.**

**Last thing, when writting author comment, I always feel as if I am 'Dear Diary'-ing the readers. It's stupid. :-| But hilarious. **


	6. Chapter 6

**I remembered one quote: Who needs enemies, when he has friends. - I like it. Iruka is probably living example of this :)**

**Anyway - which looks like its starting to be my favourite word - _on _with the story!**

* * *

><p>6<p>

Iruka was happily talking about something back and forth and Hayate was ignoring him. If he thought about it, he wouldn't even be able to say _what _was Iruka talking about.

".. and then he basically told him.." not like Hayate wasn't interested in whatever Iruka was saying. He was just worried, because he felt the presence of the person from forest, and every-time when he took a sneaky glance back, he could see a shadow creeping around.

_So he is still tailing him._ Hayate frowned to himself. _Time to do something. And time to do something drastic._ He gripped Iruka's forearm and pulled him violently inside of narrow – and _dark – _isle. He pushed him inside small niche, crouching close to him so they wouldn't be seen. He covered Iruka's mouth and shielded his brith yellow t-shirt with his own black-clad body.

"Shhh.." he whispered and followed the spiritual track, until it was far enough. He sighed in relief and uncovered his friend's mouth.

"What was that?" Iruka asked with raised eyebrow. Hayate hesitantly stood up and let Iruka do the same.

"You know.. as you told me about the one who was following you around.." Hayate scratched his head. "He didn't stop – I felt, and _saw_, him this morning in the forest and he was tailing us right now."

Iruka sighed. "Yeah, I know." he chuckled. "Why didn't you tell me, though?"

"Well, I didn't want to scare you or anything.." Hayate mumbled.

"You thought I was totally oblivious and felt the need to protect me from big, bad stalker." Iruka smiled teasingly. "Let's go find the _rest_. Or do I have to carry you, Haya-chan?"

Hayate punched his shoulders. "Right. Let's go, _Ru-chan_."

* * *

><p>They didn't have problem in finding the other team, since they had never changed their training area. They were obviously still training, so Iruka plopped down on the bridge letting his legs hang down. Hayate laid down next to him, not really caring he was blocking the path over he bridge, so everyone passing it would have to jump or step over him.<p>

"Neee.. Have you already thought about the strategy?" Iruka asked Hayate who just shook his head. "Me neither. I guess we would have to wait for those three and to see who from the jounin are playing.." the larger teen thought out loud.

"I guess.. ne, Iruka.. why do you think Ibiki-sama is not letting us take the chuunin exam?" he asked suddenly, that was something what had been bothering him for a while.

"Maybe 'cause we don't have the third.." Iruka mumbled after thinking about it. He was content – listening to the whispering water, pair of small footsteps nearing the bridge, the surreal rush of Konoha and distant noise of weapon against weapon from the training teens.

"So what? It's not like we have to be three to attend or anything.." Hayate mumbled. That would be stupid. There were no laws for the number of shinobi in team, after all, it was just _recommended_ to have four members.

"Then maybe Ibi-sama doesn't think we are strong enough.." Iruka said softly and closed his eyes.

Hayate thought about it for a moment, but it wasn't easy, because he had that feeling, that he forgot something. He checked his sword – he still had it. So what _was _that he forgot. And he felt that it was important, too.

Just when he was about to open his eyes and ask Iruka what was that he could have forgotten, he felt something hit his stretched legs and stumble over them. He heard a thump indicating the person hadn't balanced himself and Hayate almost choked as he recognized the chakra as the one that was tailing them for so long time.

_Damn. Now I know what I forgot._

"Ouch.." the one who had stumbled said, before Hayate had even time to open his eyes and that voice startled the small teen. It was a girl.

"Hay, are you alright?" asked Iruka with a frown and crouched next to the girl. He had strange expression on his face, but it disappeared before Hayate blinked. He than looked back to the girl as she refused help with standing up and took a few steps away from them, glaring at them. She had dark purple hair which was weird, but not ugly, surprisingly, and pale brown eyes. She looked angry and unfriendly and was still glaring at them, even they didn't do anything. Yet. Hayate didn't like her.

"I am Iruka and this is Hayate. What is your name?" Iruka asked her hesitantly, but with a smile on his face and Hayate wanted to facepalm, or hit his teammate. He was getting all friendly with his. Own. Stalker.

"I don't like you." Said the girl and crossed her arms on her chest looking away.

"So?" Iruka asked with raised eyebrows. "I don't like you either." he laughed and the girl stared at him with wide eyes. "What do _you_ think, Haya-kun?" he asked suddenly, sensing his friend's anger raising.

Hayate sighed. It was _so_ like Iruka to befriend someone who was trying to stalk him. "You have pretty hair, but you look like a boy." he frowned on the girl. He didn't really have a choice but to say what he thought, unless he wanted to get in argument with Iruka.

"You look like a girl, what's worse." the girl hissed on him, trying to anger him, but succeeding only in making Iruka chuckle and Hayate smile softly.

_'But Ibiki-senseeeiii, he looks like a giiiirl..' small Iruka moaned and pointed towards shocked kid, little bit smaller then himself._

_ 'So do you, so shut up.' Hayate narrowed his eyes on the rude kid with long hair._

_ 'Not my fault, my kaa-chan always wanted a daughter.' the kid laughed and the scarred jounin sighed in relief. They didn't look like they will be killing each other._

"Soo.. you wanna go play flag with us?" asked Iruka and Hayate almost smacked him. Yes, he had heart the saying: 'keep your friends close, and enemies even closer' but she was a _stalker_. But.. now that he thought about it, Iruka probably didn't even _know._

The girl looked surprised for a moment, thinking about it.

"You know, there is only five of us, and there is five of them, but they are older and stronger, so it would really, really, help us." Hayate offered. _I hope you know what you are doing, Ru._

"O-ok." The girl nodded and shyly pulled on a strand of hair. It looked as if she had been trying to make a braid on the back of her head, but almost half of her hair had somehow escaped and were falling down over her face. "I am Anko." she added and hesitantly stretched her hand towards Iruka.

_Anko. As in Mitarashi? Well, damn._ Hayate thought again and watched as Iruka shook their hands with a smile.

"Ne, Iruka.. Can I talk to you for a moment..?" Hayate asked slowly and took a hold of his friend's shoulders, pulling him away from the girl.

"Yea, wait here for a moment, Anko-chan, we will be back in no time." he promised in a cheeky grin and followed Hayate down from the bridge.

They stopped when Hayate was sure that they were somewhere no one would hear them.

"Iruka, Ru. _She_ is the one who stalked you." Hayate said bluntly watching as Iruka scratched his head.

"I know.. I just thought.. she looked lonely." he said sheepishly. "And now when we are friends, she wouldn't have a reason to stalk me or something." he muttered defensively and Hayate sighed.

"Alright. I won't question it, but.. You aren't going to ask her _why,_ are you.."

Iruka shook his head. "Maybe.. on time.. not now."

"I thought so." Hayate couldn't help but smile. "Let's go back, can't let our _friend_ waiting." he said.

"Be nice, she doesn't look dangerous or anything." Iruka frowned and they started their way back.

"She is Mitarashi. As in snake sannin's student." Hayate pointed out. _But, maybe, just maybe, that's why she is so.. weird. Just thinking that she was always with her sensei as if he was her father and then he betrayed leaving her all alone without any experience with other people._

"I don't think she is like him. She would have left, if she was." Iruka said. "And she is nice, when you get to know her." he smiled.

"You don't know her." pointed out Hayate, but was already smiling. Looks like they made new friend.

"But I will." Iruka laughed and his friend joined him. That was nice..

Maybe they, together, will be able to learn the girl how to live, again. Maybe not, but they are not going to give up.

They were Ibiki's ordinands, after all.

* * *

><p><strong>Well..that was weird. hehe. Hmm.. No Ibiki there, that makes me sad, he is such a funny character. I am actually quite enjoying the last sentence in the chapters, even though I am starting to be short on what <em>else<em> they are to their sensei.. :)**

**Oh, another question, shall we?**

**As you know, they are going to play "capture the flag" (one of my fav games, btw :P ) against the jounin. I am going to make them bet, so that the team who lost will have to _do _something.**

**Anyone has idea/wish what should the bet be about?**

**See you tomorrow, by the way. :)  
><strong>


	7. Chapter 7

**Good late morning, here it comes:  
><strong>

* * *

><p>7<p>

"That was fast." said the girl – Anko, when they returned to the bridge. She was sitting at the edge, not unlike Iruka had been, and munching on a chocolate bar. "Soo, what naughty things were you doing?" she asked cheekily and chuckled when Iruka flushed and Hayate paled.

"You.. are hentai!" Hayate yelled taken aback. Anko just blinked on him innocently.

"Takes one to find one." she shoot back with a grin and shook her head to get her hair out of eyes.

"Whaaat?"

"Wohoo – sugar!" Iruka cheered, choosing that moment to join the conversation, before something ugly happened. Anko smiled and pushed her hair behind her ears.

"You wanna?" she asked and offered them piece of chocolate.

"Thanks." Iruka said happily and sat down, too, leaving Hayate no option but to follow him. The smaller teen took a piece of chocolate, too, munching on it hesitantly, as if wondering if it hadn't been poisoned. It probably wasn't, but who knows..

"So, who else is playing?" she asked curiously.

"Well, me and Iruka, you and three other genin, they are friends of us – that's one team, the second team are jounin." Hayate took the liberty to answer, seeing as Iruka had his mouth stuffed with melting chocolate.

"So we are basically genin team and against us it will be a jounin team? Isn't that dangerous? They can easily kill us.."

"I guess. I don't really know them, but _Ru-chan_ will probably tell you more, after he is done with suffocating himself with food." Iruka poked him under ribs ans swallowed.

"Hmm.. Namiashi Raido is the first – I know him, he is nice, but can be scary. But I guess he wouldn't really hurt us in a game, he is soft." Iruka smiled. "I like him. Then, there is his best friend – Shiranui Genma. I don't really know about him, he acts as a jerk, but since Raido-san likes him, he can't be a bad person. I don't know about his abilities, but they say he is really fast – oh, he uses throwing weapon." he remembered.

Hayate nodded. He had heart that, too.

"It would be nice seeing if he is faster then Haya-chan, though.." Iruka mumbled to himself earning a curious gaze from Anko. "He is really fast. It's scary." Iruka chuckled pointing towards his small friend.

"Anyway.." the larger teen continued, "...Maito Gai is next. He is a huge fan of taijutsu, fast, strong and deathly, but he is a weirdo. All his talks about _yought _are really getting on my nerves. But he is obsessed with a fair-play, so he won't hurt us. As for Sarutobi Asuma and Yuuhi Kurenai, I don't know either, I have met them only few times, but Raido-san says they are nice."

Anko nodded. That sounded fair. She didn't really want to end up death, because of a game of 'capture the flag'.

They didn't have to wait too long after that, before there were three figures walking towards the bridge.

"Oh, finally." Iruka commented, pointing towards the three teens. Anko looked up startled – she hadn't notice.

"Are they nice?" she asked silently, looking up at Iruka with worry. Iruka gave her a grin, which she tried to answer with on of her own, but ended up frowning because her hair had fallen over her eyes, once again.

Iruka chuckled because of the heated glare Anko was giving her hair. "Yeah, you will like them."

"No." Hayate said. "They aren't nice, no matter what Iruka says. He says 'they are nice' about everyone." Anko frowned playing with her fingers.

"I see.." she mumbled.

Hayate sighed. He didn't mean to scare her, but.. "Mizuki is silent and unfriendly.." he started. _And I don't like him._ He added to himself.

"Heey, he _is _nice." Iruka argued.

"Ok, ok. But he _is _silent, and he _is_ unfriendly. Almost like Ibiki-sama when you wake him up. Izumo – he seriously is nice. But he rarely says what is he thinking, so he can be all nice to someone, but then kill him, for all I know." he continued and Iruka chuckled. In a way, Hayate was right. "And then there is Kotetsu, who is about opposite of Izumo – he is a jerk, always and even towards his friends... Eh. Almost like Iruka, here."

Iruka stabbed him under ribs again and Hayate stuck his tongue. Anko chuckled, trying to hide it behind her hand, but only succeeded on getting her hair back over face.

Iruka watched he for a moment as she struggled with her purple hair, before taking out of his pocket his spare rubber band.

"Here.." he said and showed her the band, before getting on his knees and crouching behind her. He took as much of her hair as he managed and pulled it up to a ponytail like he was wearing. He stepped back to look at his masterpiece and smiled in satisfaction. Only few strands were now free, and those weren't long enough to actually be a bother.

"Thank you.." Anko said softly, before hesitantly touching her hair. She smiled. It was much better.

"Yo, folks. What are you up-" they heard a deep voice start saying something, but it abruptly stopped. "New friend, Iruka?"

Hayate looked back to see that their friends had already come close to them – not like he didn't recognize Kotetsu's voice, anyway.

"Yeeeaa.." Iruka stretched. "She is in our team – for the game." He explained and almost stopped after the first part of his sentence. _And why not? Haya always says he wants someone to be our third, and why couldn't it be her?_

"Aaalright..?" Kotetsu said obviously waiting for further explanation. His little friend next to him elbowed him and with a roll of his eyes took a step forward.

"Don't be a jerk, idiot. Hi, I am Kamizuki Izumo, it's nice meeting Iruka's friend." he said and although smiling nicely, Anko could feel his eyes looking right trough her soul, sharp and suspicious.

"Mitarashi Anko, .. my.. _pleasure_ meeting you." she said politely and bowed her head. She didn't consider them her friend. She didn't want to touch them, didn't want to shake their hands, didn't want to get closer to them – they weren't _nice _and _warm _and neither _friends_ as Iruka, and _maybe_ even that Hayate-boy, were.

"Those two there are Hagane Kotetsu, as for the jerk who can't talk properly and Touji Mizuki, as the guy who can't talk at all." he replied sarcastically making Anko wonder if he was being cold because of her, or it it was his usual attitude. She remembered Iruka saying something about him being nice to everyone, but it certainly didn't look that way.

"Yo." Hagane Kotetsu said and cheerfully waved his hand on her, she replied with smile and bow, as her sensei had told her was the most neutral and polite way to greet someone. She shook her head to force thoughts like this away.

"Hi, nice meeting you." said that Mizuki and she got the distant feeling he was similar to _him_. To her sensei, in a way his mouth moved and how his eyes would move over her while talking.

Anko stared in fascination at that snake-kid, and absentmindedly reached to play with her hair. She didn't touch anything, just her bare cheek and that seemed to snap her out of trance, as she remembered Iruka pulling her hair up.

"So.. shouldn't we all go and find the other team, or something?" she asked finally noticing the tension around her. The boys in front of her were giving her weird looks and she almost turned around and fled, because _that_ was something she was afraid would happen if she tried to befriend anyone.

_Staring._

Yes, she knew her sensei was a sannin. And she _knew_ he was a traitor. But it wasn't _her_ fault.

"Aw! First things first!" Iruka said cheerfully and maybe little bit too loudly, and Anko turned towards him, seeing that he – and Hayate as well – were standing behind her and glaring daggers at their friends.

_I don't want them to argue._ Anko surprised herself with thinking something like that – she always thought she didn't really care about anyone else. But she was glad.

"So.. what are we going to do now?" the small kid – Izumo – asked with a raised eyebrow and took a few steps forward stepping over the imaginary line closer to Iruka and standing right next to Anko, as if he didn't give a damn about who she was.

"I am hungrryyyy!" Iruka whined and threw his arms around Anko's and Hayate's shoulders, as those two were next to him. "Let's go eat!"

And eat they went, not caring it was long after midday and not caring that everyone would stare strangely at them.

Let them stare, they couldn't care less what people say about them.

After all, Ibiki's shinobi, they were.

* * *

><p><strong>Aw, no longer listening to Drrr Ost while writing it. :) this chapter I wrote while listening to screeching and chirping of my neighbour's parrots. They are <em>loud.<em>**

**Heh. Hope you liked it :)**


	8. Chapter 8

**Ooh, well, I _know_ I am late, but I hope you will excuse me, I spent my day reading a book and enjoying the sun. :)**

**Enjoy, this is it, for today :)**

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><p>8<p>

They were all standing in a semi-circle at the edge of training ground 46 and even though Iruka with Raido had tried to make both teams interact with the other like _friends_, the circle they made was split in the middle of them with a step away and curious glances.

Iruka was smirking, which made few of the jounin and Anko uneasy and the rest of genin laugh. Silently, sneaky, of course. They didn't want to alert the jounin that something was amiss.

And of course the jounin would complain, how the other team was _late_.

"You just wanted us to be without food, so that you will win. But we aren't going to fall for that, _baaaka_." Iruka said sticking out his tongue at the dumbstruck jounin with backwards bandana and a senbon sticking out of his mouth.

The jounin, previously introduced as Shiranui Genma, frowned and took a step towards the teen, trying to look intimidating. "What did you call me..?" he asked slowly, his voice deliberately low and dangerous.

_Scaary~ _Iruka thought to himself with amusement. Too bad he, and Hayate, were more often than not at the receiving end of Ibiki's wrath.

"I believe he said something about you trying to leave us starving.." Hayate said in faked confused voice, blinking with innocence.

"Aah, don't make a knot on your brain trying to figure if he is deaf or stupid, _little one_." Mizuki said teasingly to Hayate, ignoring the presence of three jounin, one of them glaring at the beck of his head.

"Mizumizu is right, you know.. You shouldn't try to figure it all by yourself, you should just _ask _him." Kotetsu added looking really worried about his little friend. "Even though my bet is on the first.." he added thoughtfully.

"Not a chance!" Izumo cried out. "He is the latter, didn't you hear Iruka?" he pointed to the scarred teen nodding in satisfaction at his own explanation.

"Thank you, my dearest little friend." Iruka exclaimed grinning happily. "I am so glad you have faith in me, but I honestly think he is both."

"Hmm.." Kotetsu managed to look thoughtful while sneakily looking at the trio of jounin. Shiranui was furious. The senbon in his mouth kept on twitching and his eyes were lacking the usual boredom. Raido was obviously torn between amusement and embarrassment, because his two friends couldn't have a civil conversation. While the last jounin, who hadn't said a word yet, was just looking bored. And irritated.

"Alright, alright." Raido said trying to end the argument before it could get nasty, silently grateful that at least one of them – the excessively young jounin, child prodigy and the only son of the White Wolf of Konoha – was calm and collected. "Now that we know each other, we can as well go trough the rules."

"Wait up." Iruka frowned. "Raido-san, this is your whole team?" he clearly wasn't happy with it.

Raido offered him rare smile. "No, don't you worry. Gai is .. ehm.. well." He scratched his head thinking about how to explain it.

"He said he is going to take a warming-up run around Konoha. I believe he mentioned something about being bored waiting for us." unemotional voice of the last present explained and Iruka shortly wondered why did Hatake feel the need to include himself. Was he late, too, or something? Iruka shrugged, deciding he didn't care.

"So we will just start without him. You all know the game 'capture the flag', right?" he asked and when Anko shook her head, he sighed. "Alright. It's easy, really. In the territory, which is that part of training ground.." Raido raised his hand to point towards the forest, ".. each team will find a place where they would erect their flag. Mind you, it has to be visible from at least ten meters." Raido looked sternly at Iruka and the youngster chuckled guiltily.

"Alright, alright." Iruka said embarrassed.

"Around the flag, you have to mark a circle of two meters in radius. That circle is prohibited area – you can't step inside your own circle. The other team, however, can. The goal is to capture the opponent's flag and bring it to your circle. No stepping inside, though. Throw it there, or something. The moment when both the flags are inside one of the circles, the game ends."

Raido smiled, relieved the explanation was over. He didn't like having to talk for a longer amount of time, even more after meeting Iruka, because the teen tended to be ruthless and irritated after having to be quiet for a longer period of time.

And irritated Iruka was scary Iruka.

"Oh, the point is to capture the flag _and_ protect your own." Raido remembered suddenly. "Iruka-kun will show you how to color-tag other people with chakra. Being tagged equals being _killed_ and you have to do a small task assigned to return back to game. The joke is, you don't have to get the task by the one who tagged you, but until you do whatever someone has told you to do, the tag won't disappear. The smartest would be to demand task from your own team, so than it won't take so much time, but it's really up to you.."

"Alright. I think I understand." Anko smiled shyly.

"So we are waiting for the green fairy to return from a _jogging_ season and then we can begin?" Kotetsu asked and titled his head in a way curious cat would probably do.

"Basically, yes." Raido answered with a smile.

"So that means it is you four against us six? I think one of us should play on your side, if just for a _fair-play_." Iruka frowned.

"That wouldn't really help the issue, since the one would probably just try and sabotage us." Raido chuckled and Iruka couldn't help but agree.

"I will play with them, I won't cheat." Mizuki frowned and glared at the scarred jounin, daring him to oppose. "I will try my best to make my team win." he said with determination clear in his eyes.

"We accept." Hatake said before anyone could say a word. "Then it would be a .. fair-play." he added, the word feeling strange on his tongue. He was a shinobi, shinobi cheat.

"There will be a catch." Shiranui Genma suddenly said, making the others gaze at him questioningly. He just smirked. "The team loosing, will have to undergo a punishment."

If he expected an opposition, he had to be really disappointed. Iruka and Kotetsu started grinning their usual wicked grin, which obviously was contagious, because the little, seemingly innocent, girl adopted it too, and even Hayate with Izumo sported little smile.

The only unaffected were Raido, who looked more worried than anything, and Mizuki with Kakashi, who just didn't give a damn.

Hayate started chuckling suddenly. And Iruka joined him immediately afterward. That two weren't afraid of _any_ kind of punishment those jounin could think up. Basically because they would probably come up with something much, much worse.

They were Ibiki's heir, after all.

* * *

><p><strong>Uff. thats it. Tomorrow, I think, I will be even <em>later<em>. :( Places to go, things to do and so on.. Please, be patient, and.. rewiev, people! The feeling of writting something and not knowing _if_ anyone likes it, or _what_ people think about it is depressing.**

**Well, if anyone have an idea for the punishment, feel free to let me know :)**


	9. Chapter 9

**Aaalright, here goes today.**

**Byyy the way~ thank you, Neko 404 and thank you Grace, because you two really, really made my day. :)**

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><p>9<p>

Hayate pushed small amount of chakra to his feet and jumped from the ground up. He got a hold of a tree branch and pulled himself up and over the piece of wood back down. From a corner of his eye he saw something _fast _and _green_ and _close_. He made another attempt of dodging his opponent before channeling more of his chakra through his body.

"What an Awesome Maneuver!" his opponent, who was supposed to be a ninja, therefor _stealthy _and _silent_ in his persecution, yelled in a praise.

_Thanks Kami-sama it's not Iruka who he is trying to catch._ Hayate thought to himself when even his ears hurt from the voice. _Why did he feel the need to yell, when he is three steps away from me?_ At least the catch with the chakra wouldn't be necessary, he was sure that everyone in his radius had already been warned of their intruder, without him even trying.

"Eh.. thank you?" Hayate said trying to win some time and slipped trough small tunnel under three roots. He had made a note on this particular one, because he was sure _he_ would be able to pass trough, and his opponents not.

He miscalculated the speed of his opponent, though. The green idiot was probably even faster than him. _Damn._

He almost said it out loud, but caught himself, since his persecutor was standing in front of him, looking particularly smug. Maito Gai, as was his name, raised his arm and Hayate could see the small sparking of green-colored chakra.

Hayate gulped and closed his eyes. He didn't want to see it. No, not at all.

"Gotcha, babe. Heh." the teen opened his eyes blinking to see Anko standing upside down from a tree with her palm on Gai's head. Small stain of color – _pink_ color – started to appear on the jounin's head.

"Thank you, Anko." Hayate said when the girl jumped down next to him. "Good job." he praised her and for a moment let his senses wander. He didn't feel anyone's heightened chakra – that was good, no one else needed help.

"So.. Maito-san, do you want a quest from me?" Hayate asked just for the fun of the older ninja declining. Who would take a quest from the enemy, right? Maybe Iruka. Hayate chuckled. Right, he would.

"Yes! Oh my mighty opponents! Find me a Quest worthy of my Youthful skills!" the Green beast of Konoha declared and gave them raised thumps.

"Eh. I am going to see their flag, will say hi from you, Haya-_chan_." Anko lied and took a path towards Iruka, who was setting traps. Hayate stood there with a stunned expression. _First, the most unlikely thing happens, and then Anko joins Iruka in calling me _chan_. What a day.._

He looked back at the jounin, who was still standing there in expectations. _Oh, what the.. What should I give him? Something which would take long.. What would _Iruka_ give him?_

"Oh, well. Your task is to .. _borrow_ Hatake's book and then deliver it to Sandaime-sama. All the while, you are prohibited of speaking. Did I make myself clear?" he asked sweetly.

"Yosh! I shall do as you wish, young friend!" Gai said and took of to the trees. Hayate sighed. He had to find Iruka, and he had to find him _now_.

And he didn't even laugh on the retreating jounin because of his _youthful _speech, because he was on a mission now, and laughing on a mission was unprofessional, therefor, he couldn't do that.

He was after all, Ibiki's pride.

* * *

><p><strong>Sooo, whatcha think? It was short, but as I said, the chapters were supposed to be <em>short<em>. :)**

**Well, this part of the game was clearly Hayate vs Gai. The next one will be Gai vs Kakashi, and Mizuki vs Anko. (Oh, if you didn't guess until now, I do _not_ like Mizuki. Really, but I don't think I am able to make him a complete ass.. just a little bit.)**

**See you tomorrow, _kids._ :P**


	10. Chapter 10

**Back~  
><strong>

**Enjoy the chapter for today, I wrote it just for your entertainment. :)**

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><p>10<p>

_Maaan, that's so freaking stupid._ Iruka thought to himself as he were holding two different pieces of chakra wire in front of his face. _I can't connect them, not enough length._ He sighed to himself looking around, trying to find something what could possibly help him.

"What's the problem, _boss_." he caught a voice from his left and almost jumped from his skin. He hadn't been paying attention to his surroundings.

Iruka turned around to give a nod to his best friend, who was standing there, leaning against a tree and looking kinda smugly. Iruka wouldn't do that, if he were him. Hayate's hand was about three centimeters from the switch of one of his stun traps.

"I have already trapped the whole area here, it's done in a spiral, from the middle, where the flag is, up to here. I would put your hand away, by the way, if you don't want to be henged into an ant." he said in a bored voice, not even looking up when his friend yelped and jumped backwards, almost stepping on another trap.

Iruka sighed. He had to hurry up, if he didn't want any of his teammates activating the traps.

"I just don't have enough wire attached, I would have to start over from the beginning, if I didn't come up with any other way.." he mumbled to himself.

"I can always pump chakra inside of some branch or something.." he mumbled and Iruka looked back at him, contemplating.

"I forgot you can do that.." he mumbled. "Here, do it." he threw him small peace of clothing and two shuriken. Hayate looked at him strangely, but obeyed, pushing his chakra to the inanimate objects.

"By the way, I wanted to tell you, you are now officially prohibited of asking your _enemies_ for a task." Hayate informed him before disappearing to the forest.

Iruka looked after him before thrusting the two ends of wire through those shuriken, using the straps of clothing to jam them.

The young shinobi shrugged. "You know.. I was curious what would Hatake give me as a punishment. Sorry, Haya-chan.." he said to the deserted forest and laid the wire down to the ground and covered it with leaves.

"I am curious.." he mumbled to himself and pushed his chakra to the whole circuit of traps trough the wire. "Entirely too curious.." he said before pushing two his fingers inside of his mouth and whistled loud enough for the whole forest to hear.

* * *

><p>Anko sat down on a branch and panted. She was tired. She had been tailing Gai for a while now, after she saw him for the second time. He still had the color tag on his head and Anko couldn't help but giggle. The pink suited him.<p>

She jumped to another branch and realized she had already crossed the second stream. _A lot of water here._ She noticed. _Now that I think about it, there is a river in the middle. I should be going alongside of it.._

The genin took a careful look on her prey and leaped again from branch to branch. _Let's see.. I guess that Mizuki guy _is_ probably water type, while the rest of them – that weirdo is just taijutsu, Hatake is lightning, they say, Raido-san.. I would say he's earth and Shiranui is probably earth, too. Our team – I am fire, Kotetsu is lightning and Izumo is earth, too. Iruka is.. could Iruka be water?_

She stood to a halt taking a look back where she knew her teammate was, still playing with traps.

_He might as well be, I will have to tell him about the water, it could help._ She thought to herself as she peeked down on the running figure. Gai suddenly stopped, looking around and Anko did the same, in panic that someone was close.

The young girl almost fell down from the tree, as she spotted another figure just few feet from her. As in not left of right from her, but _down._ She guessed that if he got the idea to look around himself – up – she would have been spotted, but the young men was entirely too absorbed in his book to do it.

Anko giggled, trying the hardest to muffle the sound not to alert anyone to hear her, and leaped back to another tree. If she was correct, and Maito Gai _was_ looking for Hatake, they would spot her.

"My Greatest Rival!" the green jounin exclaimed and Anko saw Hatake almost fall down from the tree. She giggled again.

"What do you want _now_.." the smaller jounin asked and composed himself. "Eh? Gai? Did you need something?" he asked again, when his _rival_ stayed silent. Kakashi frowned. That wasn't like Gai, he would already throw at him some challenge or something. _Is it henge?_

Kakashi slipped down from the tree, standing just few feet from the other jounin. He titled his head, silently watching the other man for any signs of lie.

Gai gave him a thump up in a praise and looked as if he was _shining_.

_Yes, it _is_ him. Now, what did he want?_ Kakashi thought to himself, but didn't have time to guess, because his book, his precious book, gift from his beloved sensei, had disappeared.

The copy nin looked up in a shock, just to see grinning Gai, holding the small, orange object in front of him in a teasing manner.

"What the... Gai! Give it _back_!"

The green jounin just smirked more and shook his head. Anko secretly snorted. That was starting to get funny.

"Give it back, and give it _now_." copy-nin repeated icily before sliding few steps towards the other. Gai took a step back with every one Kakashi made. Then, without warning Hatake shot forwards, pulling a kunai from his pouch. The killing intent leaking from him was heavy and _cold_, it was almost burning.

Anko watched with wide eyes as Gai effortlessly dodged and jumped over his opponent. Kakashi just turned around making an almost circle with the blade, slaying it just a few centimeters away from Gai's chest.

"Give me my book, you bastard!" Hatake ordered around, positioning his hands threateningly into a Saru-seal over the kunai.

Gai just looked on the little book in his hands, than at Kakashi, and back at the book, and leaped from his heels and into the trees. He took the way towards the nearest boarders of their Training Field, his _rival_ hot on his heels.

Anko sighed in relief. The danger had passed. She had been really worried for a moment, the killing intent was something, and Gai wasn't doing anything to soothe his friend, only taunt him further.

_Crazy as bat, these jounin.. _she thought to herself with a roll of brown eyes. _But awesome, they are really strong, and fast.. They could take me down in a second.._ she admitted not really calmly.

"Well,well,well.. How ..._nice_ of you, to come and _visit_ our flag.. honestly.." Anko jumped few feet, startled. She slowly turned around – if someone wanted to attack her, she would have been already tagged.

"..Mizuki, was it.. right?" she asked, when she found herself eyes-to-eyes with the _snake_ kid from earlier. The kid gave her a smile, which was probably genuine, but didn't do anything to calm her, and clapped his hands.

"Alright. The _Ten questions_ is up. Time to tag you, _dear_." he said in a tone which got her frozen for a moment. Mizuki leaned forwards with a raised palm to tag her, and Anko panicked and fell back from the branch. She didn't even have time to panic, she knew she will fall down on her back – not enough time to turn around. Anko clenched her eyes shut preparing herself for the fall, but suddenly cold hand caught her wrist holding her in the air.

"What the hell?" Anko opened her eyes. Mizuki was crouching on the same place she had been, preventing her from falling down and trying hard not to fall too. He didn't have balance on the branch.

"Like.. _What the hell?_" Mizuki repeated and pulled her up next to her, steadying her with both of his arms. "What is the great idea in killing yourself, dammit?" he put his palms on her shoulders, shaking with her.

"Sorry.." Anko managed to say, the adrenaline leaving her, making a place for the _fear _and _panic_. She sobbed. "I am sorry.. I didn't mean to.. I just.." Mizuki pulled her closer, embracing her, because he didn't really know what to do. He was friends with _males_ all the time. Not a single girl, he could have called his friend, so he wasn't used to _crying._ Luckily, it worked. He didn't really wanted to have furious Iruka and Hayate on his case, because he had upset their little friend. They were scary.

After all, they _were_ Ibiki's boys.

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><p><strong>Aaw.. longer than I wanted. Not like I mind, but.. :)<br>**

**Hmm.. let's say, this was Kaka vs Gai and Anko vs Mizuki.. next can be.. for example.. I wanted to see Raido fight, so Raido versus .. _someone_. :)  
><strong>

**Oh, even though I don't like to do so, REVIEW PEOPLE! It makes me _happy ^^ _And I can as well do the little whinning, seeing this is my _tenth_ chapter. **

**And! If you want the loosing team to do something as their punishment, write me _and_ I will try to put it there. Honest. :D**


	11. Chapter 11

**Aalright.. Dear Diary.. :)  
><strong>

**Thanks for review, you who reviewed. :)  
><strong>

**Hehe - my cousing read this, and since she needed help with English, I was going trough it with her. We managed the first chapter. :D If you guys remember it, she made few mistakes, which sent me to a laughing fit. **

**"**Their sensei upon seeing them took few steps from his tree**" she translated as "**Their sensei made a tap-dance on the tree**" and I made the mistake of trying to imagine that. :D**

**And second, the sentence "**"I was sleeping by Iruka's.." he explained.**" she mistook with "**"I was sleeping with Iruka"**" which I am writting just to tell you, that even while I do not oppose of shounen-ai, this is _not_ going to be one.  
>And even if it was, I dont really ship Iruka with Hayate, so.. <strong>

**Enjoy the story.**

**Oh, forgot to say: I have finally gotten over the Drrr high, so I am almost normal now.  
>Listening to: Greenday - Are We The Waiting<br>**

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><p>11<p>

Anko was lazily walking towards her part of the training field, closer to their flag and – probably – closer to her teammates. She needed a task.

Unfortunately, she didn't really feel anyone – her chakra control wasn't good enough, yet.

_Iruka is probably still playing with the traps, he will be close.. _she thought to herself, checking the area around her for any signs of her friend.

She halted somewhere she assumed was the board of their and enemy area. _I don't really want to stumble on any of Iruka's trap, though.._ Anko chuckled.

Just when she was thinking about what could she possibly do, loud whistle interrupted the calm silence of forest.

_Speak of the devil.._ She channeled small amount of chakra to her fingers and toes, before pushing it from her, into the ground and into the air, just like Iruka had told them all to do, when they hear him.

Anko changed her direction and went towards where she heard the whistle – not that Iruka would stay there, now that he had alerted everyone to his location, but it will help her with finding someone.

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><p>Iruka laid both of his hands on the ground, concentrating on the chakra energy streaming around him, under him and in him. He didn't waste time trying to recognize each and every chakra pattern he felt, he just pushed them towards the closest trap of his. He added his own chakra carefully.<p>

The trap made soft clicking noise and Iruka sighed in relief. Now the traps won't react to them.

The brown-haired teen titled his head. He was listening.

_Guess no one was curious enough to go and investigate. _Iruka grinned to himself, before deciding to change his location, anyway. One peek at their flag wouldn't hurt him, and he could make sure no one got trough.

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><p>Not really far away from the scared genin, one older jounin looked sharply towards the source of the noise. He crouched down at the base of a tree hiding in it's shadow and moved his senbon from right side of his mouth to left.<p>

_A trap._

He bit hard on the senbon almost hurting his lip. His eyes were lidded, he was thinking.

_Need a comrade._

Genma took a deep breath before searching the forest for the chakra signature of his friend. Good, Raido wasn't far away from him – he was, actually running right into him. That was good, Genma could wait.

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><p>Namiashi Raido liked to think that he had a good sense of deduction. However, in the moment he heard the whistle and knew it went from the enemy, he didn't know what to think.<p>

Yes, now he knew where the enemy is, so he could as well go there and tag him. However, his enemy wasn't stupid enough to turn the attention towards their flag, so he was probably at the very opposite side of their area, than the base was.

Logically, he should go far away and search for the flag. _But.. _that was probably the thing they wanted all along.

So he took a calming breath and stalked towards the place where the whistle came from. He stopped for a moment, just to think about it. He smiled. It wasn't war. He can as well stop thinking about the strategy and _play_.

* * *

><p>He was confused. One moment he had been running after the <em>thief<em> and the next, the green monster disappeared from his sight. And he wasn't able to find a single trace of him.

Hatake Kakashi, the legendary copy-nin, lost track of his enemy in his own village.

He sighed. Sometimes he hated his own reputation.

_Damnit. Why did he steal me my book? I don't really care about him now, I will find him later, after the game is over.. And if not, I will just have few days of piece without his absurd challenges._

The jounin managed to smile. It didn't sound so bad, after all. He didn't even care where he was going, just wandering around, thinking. He stopped death on his track, as he spotted something blue just in front of him.

_What the.. is this their flag?_ He looked wide-eyed down to the ground and saw a chakra line just about thirty steps in front of him. _Heh. It is, isn't it._ He wanted to laugh. He – who didn't even want to play, instead just lay down and read – had found the flag.

_Looks like I get to play, aft – _loud whistling noise interrupted his musings and he instinctively covered his ears. He blinked and looked around trying to decipher the reason behind it. Yes, he could feel the chakra surfaces raising and calming back down, but he didn't know _why_.

Kakashi raised his hand and tentatively touched his hitai-ate. _Should I..?_ He shrugged and moved the clothing away, feeling his chakra circling inside of him, spiraling and flaring.

He closed his right eye concentrating only on the sharingan and took a look around.

There – all around him were chakra wires and spots where the energy was stronger. _Traps._ He smiled. _And good ones, at that._

He spotted one of them just two steps in front of him. _Looks like the whole area is trapped now.. It had to cost lot of chakra to make them all work.._

Kakashi jumped to a tree when he heard soft steps, leaning against it with his back and carefully avoiding any traps. He moved a bit so he would be all covered with a shadow. He waited for the person to come closer before he would attack.

* * *

><p>Hayate was laughing hard. He had heard Iruka's signal and of course answered it with his chakra, but then he decided to go take a look if some enemy had got the great idea of investigating. He had aimed his steps towards the area and almost stumbled over Kotetsu.<p>

Who wouldn't? The other genin had been just _laying _there, not even moving. Hayate had crouched beside him, hitting him over head.

"What are you doing here?" he had asked, not really expecting any intelligent reply.

"We are close to the boarders, Izumo went inside and I told him I will try and wait here for him." the genin had whispered and that was the time Hayate had started laughing.

"C'mooon.. Let's go fight." he said instead of explaining his laughing fit and nudged his friend. He wasn't going to let him just _wait_ there. They were going to fight, and they were going _now_.

Laying and waiting won't end any war, Hayate knew it – and knew, that Iruka knew that, too.

They were, after all Ibiki's followers.

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><p><strong>Short, I know. Thats the idea.<strong>

**Be nice and review, reading a feedback can fully change my mood. To the better. :)  
><strong>

**See you tomorrow, I hope.**


	12. Chapter 12

**Hiii. :)**

**Tomorrow the school year is starting again. Surprisingly, I am happy about it. :) And scared. Just a bit. This is my last year on secondary. **

* * *

><p>12<p>

_Ten meters.. Nine.. Eight.. Seven.. Five. Stop. He stopped._

Kakashi titled his head. _Aah, here he goes. Three.. Two.. Go!_ He leaped from the shadow and gripped the enemy teen under his neck, second hand coming to rest on his right wrist.

He had to say, that kid was good - he didn't scream. Yet.

"I should just tag you, you know.." Kakashi whispered but didn't move to do so.

"Yes, you probably should." the teen agreed with him.

"You are Umino, right." Kakashi moved closer to get a look at his prisoner over his shoulder. The kid was almost the same height as him and that unnerved him a little. Yes, he was used to all of his comrades being about two heads higher, but he didn't like that even _genin_ was now so tall.

"That's not how it works, if you want to get to know someone, you should know their name _first_, and _after_ that continue on the intimacy, like.. walking in the forest together, embracing, holding hands.. You know." Iruka titled his head to hide his smirk.

"..."

The genin wanted to laugh. Looked like he got the copy-nin, and he got him good. Iruka slowly raised his free hand and laid it on Kakashi's one, intending on tagging the older shinobi.

"What are you doing?" Hatake finally found his voice and blinked on the kid. What did he mean with _holding hands_? He was just trying to prevent him from moving.. And what was he doing?... His sharingan caught small move in the kid's chakra and Kakashi jumped back, freeing Iruka.

_Maa, he wanted to tag me.._ Kakashi smiled his usual smile. Iruka turned around to take a look at his opponent adopting a fighting stance.

"I am not going down without fight, you know.." the genin grinned. It will need just a small push and Hatake will fall into a trap. Good.

"You can always try." answered Kakashi in a tone which clearly added that the genin didn't stand a chance.

"Oh, don't I feel so special.." Iruka mumbled. _Kunai. Second one and the rest of the chakra wire. Not enough. Need a plan._

Kakashi was intently watching the young one in front of him. Looked like he was concentrating hard on something.

"Maa, stop thinking, I can see the smoke already."

Iruka briefly looked at him. _Just what I needed. _"Just shut up! Bastard!" he yelled and threw one of his kunai on the older one. He missed. That was good, he had wanted to.

Kakashi grinned and leaped towards his enemy. _He is angry. That will be easy. _He pulled out his own kunai and aimed the blunt end on Iruka's thorax.

_That should send him to the realm of dreams for some time._

Kakashi missed.

* * *

><p><em>Not funny. <em>Anko pouted. She had wanted to find someone, but managed only to spot _Mizuki_ again. She took a look around, but no one was close anyway. Anko shrugged.

"Hey. Give me a task, please." She said firmly and jumped down from the tree just in front of him. Looks like he was doing something like a patrol.. We _are _on the boards, after all. Anko smirked.

"Nuh-uh. Go find someone from your team." he said and tried his best to just walk away. He had a quest, damn it! He needed to take care about everyone who would try to go trough.

"But you _can't _just refuse. It's against the rules!" _At least I think._ Anko took a step left. She wasn't going to let him go. Not when she can sabotage his patrolling.

"I can."

"Can't."

"Can, and _will_." Mizuki jumped to the trees, but the younger girl followed him.

"I am not going to let you be, unless you give me one." she smirked. Oh soo evil.

"Not gonna happen." he tried to escape to another tree, but found himself stuck in between Anko and a tree.

"Give me a task." she ordered again.

"No." He refused. He was being stubborn, and knew it. _Well, I can as well tell her that her task will be 'let me go', but then she would be free to tag me. Not talking about the fact, that I would loose._

"Give me a task." there was a sweet smile on her lips and Mizuki turned his face away.

"No."

Anko laughed. She moved to a side, so that he will have to look straight to her eyes. "Task~" she sang.

Mizuki turned away, again. "Not gonna happen."

"Task."

"No."

"C'moooon..just one _smaaall_ task.. It won't kill you."

"Not now, not _ever_."

"Hehe." That was fun.

* * *

><p>"Stop right there!" said a deep voice and Kotetsu froze. Hayate jumped away. He was good at disobeying orders. He jumped to a tree, but when he landed he almost bumped into one smirking jounin, who was crouching there and looking kinda smug.<p>

Hayate yelped and jumped away, missing the palm with chakra just so.

"He warned you." chuckled the crouching jounin and took three senbon from his pouch. Hayate was watching him with wide-eyes. _He's not gonna kill me, right.._

"Don't kill him, Genma!" Raido shouted up from his position on the ground. He exited the shadow he was hiding in and smiled on the genin, who was probably going to be his opponent.

"Aww.. Spoilsport." Genma pouted and threw his senbon after Hayate.

_I see them. I can. He didn't throw them full speed. Means, I can dodge._ He jumped away, landed on his palms and pushed off of them, reversing himself again. _Ha. Thought so._ Hayate smirked smugly which got him a raised eyebrow of the jounin.

"Impressive. Not." Genma said and prepared another three senbon to throw. Hayate touched the hilt of his katana in reassuring gesture. _Assist me, my friend._ He pulled the blade out in one swift motion and jumped towards Shiranui. _Let's have some fun._

* * *

><p><em>Just hope he's not gonna hurt the kid badly<em>. Raido sneaked a look up.

"Heeeey.. Look at _me_. I am your opponent, I am your _whole. World._" Raido blinked before obeying and taking a careful look on the static figure of a boy, who he knew under name of Hagane Kotetsu.

"..Right." the jounin said. "Let's .. fight?" he asked. The kid was smirking. Smug, insane smirk.

"Naah.. what about we dance polka, instead?" he asked in an arrogant way.

Raido sighed. He took a step forwards. And another one. _He doesn't look like he has any weapon at all. Guess it will be easy._ Raido took out of his pouch two shuriken and attached an explosion card on it.

Kotetsu jumped forward, getting away from the range of explosion, and closer to Raido. He was still smiling, and he still didn't have any weapon unsheathed.

"I know what you are thinking. _Raido-kun_." Kotetsu said and halted few steps in front of him.

"..." Raido waited. Watched.

"..." Kotetsu smirked and tapped his thigh.

"... what.." The smirk only widened.

"You are thinking about how this will be easy. How I am only a genin, how you don't need to go out fully on me. And you know what?"

Raido raised both his eyebrows. "What?"

"You are right!" Kotetsu threw his head back and laughed.

"... Aalright..?"

"And you know what more?" Hagane asked when he stopped laughing.

Raido sighed. He contemplated just hitting the kid over his head with some branch to get rid of him. "No, I don't. What." he said instead, realizing that there is _no _branch harder that the kid's head.

"I am not going to go out fully on you." he smiled.

"_What?_" Raido asked, his eyes going wide open.

Kotetsu reached inside his pouch and pulled out two shuriken leaving the pouch emty.

"I will take you down just with those two." he informed calmly and lightly gripped the wire that was connecting them – not like Raido could see it. Kotetsu rotated the two shuriken and lunged himself on his opponent.

He wanted to win. And he wanted it badly.

"I am, after all, Ibiki's fan."

* * *

><p><strong>Well, guess the next chapter will be more about fighting. :)<strong>

**What do you think, by the way - who will win? :D And you can try and guess how. **

**See you tomorrow, hopefully.  
><strong>


	13. Chapter 13

**Looks like I wont be finishing the game today, after all :)**

**Huh. This is my longest story, _ever_. Thirteen chapters. Thats just weird.  
><strong>

**Hehe, enjoy. :)  
><strong>

* * *

><p>13<p>

_ "Maa, stop thinking, I can see the smoke already."_

_ Iruka briefly looked at him. Just what I needed. "Just shut up! Bastard!" he yelled and threw one of his kunai on the older one. He missed. That was good, he had wanted to._

_ Kakashi grinned and leaped towards his enemy. He is angry. That will be easy. He pulled out his own kunai and aimed the blunt end on Iruka's thorax._

_ That should send him to the realm of dreams for some time._

_ Kakashi missed._

Iruka jumped up when Kakashi lunged on him, he didn't aim his move towards the branch, no, he jumped straight up and pushed himself off of the tree. He fled over the branch, towards the ground, and tangled the wire in between his fingers. He crossed both his hands with wire nets once, and once more.

_Just a second!_ He bended his fingers and gripped the chakra wires in fast trained movement. _Two meters._ The ground was close. Iruka stretched his arms and let himself fall down flat on his stomach.

_Hope I didn't screw it._ He quickly prayed to all gods he could remember and watched wide-eyed the nearing surface. _Damn._ He thought as he could already recognize each and every blade of grass. _Damn_. He thought as he heard the chakra wire moan and cut the branch. _Damn._ He thought as the chakra wire strained and pulled on his palms, wrists and chest, where he had crossed them. _Damn_. He thought, as he was launched back up and rolled in the air so that his beck was facing the ground. He stilled two feets above the surface.

_Damn, I am good._ He though as he couldn't hold back a chuckle. It worked, without the usual calculating and stuff, and it worked good.

Iruka didn't have time to congratulate himself, because right there, on his left, was standing one confused copy-nin. The copy-nin who had tried to put him asleep. The same copy-nin who had probably heard his wicked laugh. _Damn._

"He-he. That was fun." Iruka grinned and freed himself from the wire. He didn't let go of it, yet. _Time to play the Spider._ The genin took out more of the wire with a single pull and jumped up to a branch before one flying kunai could hit him. Then down and to the left, so that he was passing the copy-nin. And up again, and down, up, down, left. Dodge another kunai. Roll down, around the tree, up, jump to the close branch, down. Back where he had landed.

"Ne.. Kakashi. Do you like spiders?" Iruka titled his head a little and watched as the jounin halted.

"No." Hatake threw a kunai and Iruka clashed it with his own.

"Hmm.. Too bad. I like them. And.. Do you like flies?"

Kakashi blinked. "... why?"

"Because, my dear Kakashi..," Iruka smiled wickedly, "You are going to know _how_ does one fly live.. and … I am the spider."

* * *

><p>Raido lazily crouched as one of the shuriken flew past him. <em>Is that kid for real? Pre-genin would dodge that.<em>

"I _know_ what you are thinking, Raido." Kotetsu smirked again. He was still holding the second shuriken in his palm.

"Well.. good for you." Raido mumbled and rotated a kunai on his middle finger. _To throw or not to throw.._ He threw it and Kotetsu repelled it with the shuriken.

"I know, right." There was a wicked smile on his face and almost maniacal light in his eyes.

Raido heard a movement of air behind him and turned partly around, so that he won't let his opponent out of his sigh. Kid or not, it's against the common sense to turn his back on an enemy. His eyes went wide when he saw the same shuriken Kotetsu had thrown on him, returning back. He hit it with a kunai and changed it's trajectory.

"Impressive." Kotetsu laughed and waved his arm in front of him. He sent the weapon back on the static form of Raido. The jounin repelled it again, and again Kotetsu sent it on him.

_That's starting to get old. Seems like he can control it, probably with chakra.. that means.. if I catch it.._ Raido prepared himself and caught the weapon in between his palms. He smiled.

"Garde." Kotetsu said calmly and threw the second shuriken just a feet to the left, attaching second chakra wire to the middle of the first.

"You missed." Raido frowned. He felt the tugging on the shuriken. _Can it be..?_ He abruptly let the shuriken go and jumped away, but the shuriken had already flew past him, changing it's direction because of the wire, and wrapped itself around his shoulders.

"Looks like Check." Kotetsu titled his head to the side. And he was still smiling.

* * *

><p>Hayate bled. He could smell it, feel it and even <em>see<em> the small drops of red liquid falling down on the branch. He didn't like blood. Not his own. He gripped his katana more tightly and dodged another series of senbon.

_I need to get closer to him, I can't even fight him like this._

He jumped forward and was forced to retreat once again by a formation of kunai. _Aaaw! Stupid senbon, stupid jounin. _He was starting to get frustrated. The fact that Genma hadn't _once_ moved from his position didn't help the matter.

"Are you just going to be lazy there?" he mumbled so that Shiranui won't hear him. He didn't need any more smug replies. Hayate moved his hand inside of his pouch to know what else could he use.

_Let's see.. Five more kunai, seven shuriken, but I can't use them very good, I am more into short-range fights. Two meters of chakra wire, yodisol, bandages, scarf.. Why do I carry a scarf around? Small box of soldier pills and blood pills, smoke bomb filled with something stinking, I don't really want to know what Iruka put there, a knife, small piece of paper and pencil.._

Hayate sighed. The only think he could use were the weapon and the smoke bomb. And that would be just ridiculous, not talking that he didn't really want to _traumatize _the jounin.

"What's up, _kid_?" Genma asked bored. He was just trying to tick him of, Hayate knew it.

The genin smirked a little and took out the bomb. _It will help. At least to distract him. And then.. _He grinned evilly and threw it without second thought.

He was, after all Ibiki's pupil.

* * *

><p><strong>Two things - "garde" is a phrases in a game of chess, in the moment when the Queen is in danger; and yodisol is a brand of yodine.<br>**

**Aah, new favourite word (wicked) as I can see. Bleh. :D**

**R..r..r..rock is death by M. Manson is the song I was listening to while writting this. So.. review :D  
><strong>


	14. Chapter 14

**Hi :)  
><strong>

**Neko-san, thank you, again, for reviewing and basically being nice. :)**

**Anyway, It is a little short, but I am beaten. :D We had our first Aikido training after two months, and it was harsh. :) And awesome.**

**Haha, not to bore you with personal stuff, here you go:**

* * *

><p>14<p>

_No, no, no, no.. I can't loose to a genin.._ Kakashi's mind was in state of chaos. From all around him there were sharp wires cutting his skin and trying to hold him still and behind the almost invisible mass of thread was lazily standing the one and only Umino Iruka, grinning wolfishly on the struggling jounin.

"Does Ibiki know that you can do this?" Kakashi shot on him, trying to loosen his concentration. It worked for a small moment, and the copy-nin managed to free his left hand. _Good. Now the second one._

"This isn't jutsu, Hatake-san." Iruka frowned.

_Back to formalities? Maa, aren't you little messed up? _"I guess that's 'no', then. Don't you think he would like to know?" Kakashi smirked.

"N-no. He wouldn't be interested in something.. weak like this. I don't have it mastered yet." Iruka answered hastily. _Heh, second arm. Now: __Ox –__ ha__re –__ ho__rse –__ m__onkey __–__h__orse. _His hands flashed in set of trained moves, his Sharingan moving in his eye and his whole body burning with electricity.

"Chidori..." he whispered and quickly moved to free himself from the wires. He wasn't thinking about attacking the kid, he just wanted to be able to move. The wires fell down in small pieces, occasionally shimmering with chakra.

"Uh-oh." Iruka said not loosing his grin. "Looks like you didn't really like the game of Spider.." he mumbled.

"Nah, I liked it. It's just.. I don't want to be eaten, yet." Kakashi eye-smiled and flashed next to the genin. Iruka startled. He hadn't seen him move. And then he watched with wide-eyes as the copy-nin put his palm on the slightly smaller genin's shoulder and tagged him.

Iruka blinked. _That's all? I thought he's gonna kill me or something.._ He shrugged.

"Soo, _Kakashi-kun_, give me a task?" he asked innocently, but his smile was wicked.

* * *

><p>Mizuki was pissed. There he thought he would just go around the boarder and take care of every passer-by wannabe, but the <em>stupid<em> women hadn't let him go, yet.

"Will you just move it, damnit?" he asked harshly, not for the first moment. He had even tried to fight her, but she remained passive, in a way she dodged his every blow, but hadn't fought back. It was unnerving him. Teasing him. Taunting him. Ticking him off. What_ever_.

"Will you just gimme a task, damnit?" she copied him blinking innocently.

"No." Mizuki growled.

"Heh."

* * *

><p>"So.. gonna give up, yet?" the bored looking jounin asked Hayate in his usual tone, which sounded.. bored.<p>

"Never." he said calmly, even thought he was bleeding a _lot_ right now and Genma had even somehow managed to nail him to the nearest tree. And all that without even leaving his branch. _Stupid jounin, damned senbon, damned to hell._ Hayate gritted his teeth.

"You sure? I could kill you right now. Game or not, I don't like you. You are stubborn." Genma titled his head.

"Aren't you little talkative towards someone you don't like?" Hayate teased and let out breath he didn't know he was holding. He gripped the smoke bomb and smirked.

Genma looked away for a moment trying to find something to say.

_Now._ Hayate flicked his wrist and threw the bomb, activated with small flare of his chakra. He threw it just a bit under the tree, so that the jounin won't see it. But – gas always goes _up_.

_Now I just have to get rid of those senbon. And even if I don't, it would be nice revenge before I let him tag me. _Hayate grinned. He concentrated on the jounin who started frowning. And blinking. And looking suspiciously around himself.

"What the.." Genma said as his eyes started watering and his nose burning. He looked towards the captured genin who had rather nasty smile on. "What did you do?" he asked with halfway closed eyes.

"You know.. That's not really good idea.." Hayate told him and tried the strength of those senbon. They were stuck deep. He wobbled those ones, that didn't go trough _him_ in an attempt to loosen them up.

"..." Genma tried to clear his eyes, but only managed to get the liquefied gas all over his face.

"If you have your eyes half closed, you won't protect your eyes, and neither will you be able to see. Choose one – look, or save your eyes." _Ha, that one is going out._

One of the senbon fell down and almost pierced his shoes. _Ow, bad aim._ He hadn't really helped himself, the senbon was from between his abdomen and chest, so the only thing he could free was absolutely futile part of his body. _Damn._

The genin tried another one. And another. And few others, but the jounin did a good job, obviously. _Time to act._

"You know.. Genma_-san_.." Hayate chuckled nervously. "I.. you know.. I give up. You can tag me."_ Better than him _killing_ me, even thought it's a major injury to my pride._

And that's something he couldn't tolerate.

He was Ibiki's successor, after all.

* * *

><p><strong>Hope you liked it, if not, tell me why. If you did, tell me whats your fav color :D mine is green. :P<strong>

**Bye-bye, till tomorrow.  
><strong>


	15. Chapter 15

**Hi. I didn't write anything yesterday, I was tired. And I am today, too, emotionally drained and physically beaten up from my and frisbee seisson. :D However, I can't neglect the story, now, can I? :)**

**Enjoy.**

* * *

><p>15<p>

"You are going down, jounin." Kotetsu whispered and patted the jounin's head. He pushed chakra trough his finger tips and onto Raido's hair.

Raido sighed. How embarrassing, he had been defeated by a genin. Taken by a surprise. And on top of it, the insane kid had probably tagged him with some horrible color like pink or bright green.

"Heh. Don't worry your pretty head. I used dark blue." Kotetsu chuckled and took a step back. He tugged on the chakra wire letting Raido free.

"Aaah, thank you." Raido smiled and stretched his arms. "But even though you are so nice and kind and all, I am _not_ going to ask you for a task." he informed.

"Maa, that transparent, am I." Kotetsu laughed. "Well then, I am off." he shrugged and waved over his shoulders.

"Wait up!" Raido called after him. Kotetsu turned around surprised.

"What's up?"

"Are you going to help your little friend?" the jounin asked curiously. _Because I don't think he will be able to defeat Genma._

"Oh, should I?" Kotetsu blinked. "'Cause Ruka said Hayate is really good and all.."

Raido sighed again. "Look, kid. You are good, but you took me down 'cause of a surprise. Genma is not going to go easy on him."

"If you say so.. Alright! Am going to help him! See ya." Kotetsu turned around once again.

"That's why I said 'wait up'. Am going with you, need a task from Genma." He grinned and jogged next to the smaller shinobi.

* * *

><p>"Hey, woman, let me go!" Mizuki yelled on the purple-haired kunoichi who had decided that the best way how to stop him from struggling is to climb on top of him. And so she had done it.<p>

"Of course." she said nicely.

"...but?" Mizuki raised his eyebrows.

"_But_ you have to give me a task." Anko chuckled.

"No, no, no, no.. Aah, wait." he closed his eyes. _I don't want to loose. But like this we can't continue on the game. I can't tag her, because she is tagged already, and she can't tag me, 'cause she's outta the game. _"What a pain.."

Anko titled her head. "Are you going to give up?" _Like..really? What is he going to ask me, to kill myself?_

"Yea.. don't have enough patience for you. Your task will be.." _Need something smart. _"...to sit down under the tree and just sit there, until someone find you." _Hehe, here you go._ Mizuki grinned.

This time it was Anko who raised her eyebrow. "Aaalright..?" She let him go and jumped from the tree. Anko sat down, shrugging.

"Nee.. Mizuki. You found me, thank you." she said after few seconds of silently sitting there.

Mizuki, who hadn't had the time to leave yet, hit his forehead with his palm. _Damn._

* * *

><p>"You want a task from me, hmm..?" Kakashi considered it for a moment.<p>

"Yup!" Iruka copied the copy-nin's usual way of smiling and beamed.

Kakashi smiled back. "Alright. You are to help me get revenge on Gai." He grinned obviously satisfied with himself. Iruka chuckled.

"Can we prank him?" he asked hopefully and stood next to his senpai looking up at him in almost worshiping manner.

"Of course."

* * *

><p>"Tag you? Tag you? I am going to <em>kill <em>you, brat!" the jounin yelled and blindly threw three shuriken. "Slowly and Painfully!" he added with a sadistic gleam. Hayate gulped.

"Maa, you shouldn't hurt your fellow shinobi, Genma-san.."

"You aren't shinobi, you are a monster!" another senbon stack itself centimeter above Hayate's right ear. "You know how it smells? And hurt? Damnit! What did you put into it?"

"Heh, funny thing.." Hayate chuckled nervously, eying another set of sharp _things_ in between of Genma's fingers. "I don't know.. ask Iruka." _Ew.. Iruka isn't going to be happy.. But anyway, he is better in these kind of situations then I am.. And he will be _proud_ on me for using his weapon._

"... Damn you, damn you to _hell_, Raido!" Genma grunted in a low voice, promising his best friend all kinds of torture he could remember. _Not being for you, I would never go play a game with your _nice_ genin friend and his comrades._

"And how is this _my_ fault, now?" asked a deep voice with a hint of amusement. Genma almost jumped from his skin and only accidentally stopped himself from piercing Raido with a needle.

"Dammit! Don't sneak on me! Baka!"

Raido raised his arms in defenseless gesture. "Sorry, sorry. I was actually going to ask you for a task, but you should probably finish it with the kid, before you have to fight them both." Raido chuckled and pointed his finger towards where Kotetsu was forcedly pulling the senbon out of Hayate.

"Hehe – you look like a _hedgehog_!" Kotetsu laughed and tugged on a senbon sticking out of his friend's wrist.

"..That makes two of us.." Hayate grunted back.

"A! Stop it right NOW!" suddenly there was another senbon right next to Hayate's head. "Not until I tag him." Genma said firmly and jumped next to the two genin. He raised his hand and slapped Hayate's cheek without any force. Green hand-shaped stain appeared.

"There." Genma whispered self satisfied and poked the other genin under his ribs. "Ha! Two in one hit." He grinned and turned to get rid of those senbon nailing Hayate to the tree.

"Wha..?" Kotetsu asked bewildered. "I wasn't even your enemy!" He argued but Genma only smiled on him.

"Who said you have to?" a chuckle. "I tagged you, and now you three are in my mercy, because you can only get a task from _untagged _player." He grinned rather evilly. "And better than going to find someone else, you can listen to what I have to say."

There was a moment of silence, interrupted only by the sound of a blood running down to the ground. Raido joined them in their task of freeing the older genin.

"You really went hard on him.." Raido mumbled as he watched the pale kid. He inspected one of those injuries, which were close to organs. They didn't look seriously, fortunately.

"I am sorry about it." Genma shrugged and supported Hayate's weigh when the last senbon was out. He picked him up and jumped down to the ground, helping him to sit. "You alright?" he asked carefully.

"Yea.. Just shut up." Hayate glared on him. "What is the task?" he asked quickly, before anyone else would be able to ask him about his well being. He hated it. It was bad enough knowing that after meeting up with Iruka, the boy will go to his mother-hen mode.

Genma studied him for a moment. "I want to get back on Umino. For the bomb."

Hayate's eyes went wide and he didn't know what to answer.

"First of all, call him Iruka. Then, we can talk." said Kotetsu firmly and landed next to them.

Genma sighed. "I want to get back on Umino Iruka. For the bomb." he repeated emotionlessly.

"And _how_ per say do you want to do it?" asked Raido with a frown.

Hayate stood up slowly. His body hurt but he snatched away Kotetsu's and Genma's hands trying to help him. He could do it himself.

"I don't know yet, but I think you lot can help me.."

"What about some prank? It's harmless enough." Kotetsu titled his head. "He does it often enough, it's time to-"

"I refuse." Hayate declared and interrupted whatever Kotetsu had been saying. He couldn't care less. Hayate glared back on those three who were looking at him with wide eyes because of his outburst. "Iruka is my friend, I am _not_ going to go against him. I will find someone else to give me a task and I will warn _him_ about you trying to _hurt_ him."

He was so ticked off. He didn't even know why. Was it because of the idea Genma had come with? Or because Raido, who had Iruka considered his only friend from the rank of jounin, had agreed to help? Or because _Kotetsu_ had agreed? Kotetsu, who had been Iruka's best friend at the academy, before even meeting Izumo, Kotetsu who had met Iruka as a toddler and they had each other's back every time they played ninja.

That wasn't something Hayate could tolerate.

He was, after all, Ibiki's idealist.

* * *

><p><strong>I didn't make Kotetsu bad guy, I just think the way I write him, he is someone who wouldn't pranking someone as a revenge like this take like a bad thing, even though Hayate would. Guess Iruka wouldn't either.. :D <strong>

**I think I like protective Hayate, though.**

**Hope you liked it,**

**see you tomorrow.  
><strong>


	16. Chapter 16

**Hi. :) **

* * *

><p>16<p>

No one was fighting anymore, even though the game wasn't over yet and they knew it. However no one really had it in himself to fight again – Raido with Genma and Kotetsu had been plotting, at first, but quickly lost the topic and started chatting about nothing and everything. Anko with Mizuki were still arguing and trying to tag each other – Anko with amusement, Mizuki with fury. As for Hayate, he was wandering around, hoping to find Iruka. Not succeeding. The three whistles, signalizing end of the game, found Iruka still with Hatake, jumping from branch to branch, as they planned how to get back on Gai for stealing Kakashi's book.

"Wha?" Iruka stumbled and quickly jumped to another tree, before he could fall down.

"Who won?" was Kakashi's calm reaction.

"Donno.." Iruka mumbled. Did he miss the whole game just _talking_? Maa, that sucked.

"We should head out of the area, to meet the others." Kakashi informed in a way which clearly said not to oppose. It wasn't a suggestion, it was an order.

"Aaalright." The turned left, where the calm blueness of the river was seen. "Anyway, we should go trough the 'Freak Gai Up no Jutsu' again.."

* * *

><p>"What happened!" Hayate asked the moment he exited the woods. He was breathing hard - running injured was not his hobby.<p>

"..." Hayate watched Iruka's eyes getting wider with every passing second and sighed. _Heeere it comes._ He sneakily covered his ears.

"What the HELL DID YOU DO?" Iruka pointed towards his bloody torso.

"Well.. I kinda.. sorta.. got into a fight?" Hayate said amused.

"Come right here, right now." the brown-haired genin said firmly and, _fortunately, _calmly. Hayate obeyed rolling his eyes. He sat down and let Iruka take off his shirt and inspect the wounds.

"Doesn't look nice, Hayate.." he mumbled.

"I know, right. Just.. heal it or something. And tell me who won, damnit." Iruka nodded and took the iodine Hayate had offered him. He wasn't able to do any advanced healing jutsu, only the basic ones, but he still could clean and cloth the injuries.

"We won." Iruka informed him, too absorbed in his work to explain it more clearly.

"Eh? How?" Hayate asked, but his friend didn't even raise his head, neither did he nod to acknowledge he had heard him. He probably hadn't. "Hey, how did we win?" he turned around carefully, not to move his torso too much, and addressed the other four who were sitting around.

"Maa.. your little friend took the flag and threw it into the circle, I believe." Kakashi chuckled pointing to a blushing Izumo.

"Yeah! He was awesome!" Anko declared and half-hugged him with one of her arms.

Mizuki stayed silent, but nodded anyway.

"I didn't do anything special.." Izumo mumbled when Hayate started cheering, getting himself light smack over his head from Iruka for moving. "You all were just too absorbed with your enemies to fight me." he grinned. "I believe my opponent had jogged somewhere else."

Hayate chuckled nervously. "Hehe, you're right.." he reached to scratch his head in a nervous gesture, but quickly thought against it, as Iruka sent him a warning glance.

"Why did he do it anyway?" Mizuki asked with a frown. "It's not really responsible to just _leave_ in a middle of a fight. Even if the fight's just for fun."

"I told him to do so." Hayate answered and hid his face in Iruka's shoulder.

"Why did you do that?" Asked Anko with amusement.

"It was a task."

"And what _exactly _was his task, if I may ask?" Kakashi joined the conversation when _horrible _suspicion struck him.

"Well.. I told him.. to _borrow_ your book and deliver it to the Hokage." Hayate mumbled and clenched Iruka's shirt in his hands, hoping that Hatake won't attack the injured, and if he did, then that Iruka would protect him.

"..borrow.. He hadn't asked for it, therefore he stole it. He obviously didn't finish your task."

"I know that." Hayate nodded. "I knew it the moment he left to find you, 'cause I told him not to talk from that moment, and he answered me."

"That means we are in no need to prank him, seeing it wasn't his foult your little _baby_ was stole." Iruka smiled when he finished putting bandages over Hayate's chest. "Trousers, down." he ordered and took out few more packs.

"Well, we as well can." Kakashi eye-smiled on him and Iruka laughed.

"We will talk about it later."

"Are we going _up_, today?" Izumo asked silently and laid down on the warm grass, closing his eyes and enjoying the sun. "Ko's almost here, so after you finish turning Haya into a mummy, we can as well go." he smiled and Hayate stuck out his tongue.

"Donno about you, but _I _have one Shiranui to kill, and after that, Jijii-sama promised to take me to the ramen." Iruka laughed silently and cleaned skin around one of the wounds with a iodine covered cotton.

"You are such an addict." Mizuki smiled. Some things never change. "Still plenty of time, after that." he pointed out.

"Well.. I was thinking about asking Ibi-sama if he needed some help, he looked overworked." Iruka shrugged and turned back to his task. "But you go, I will maybe join you after that."

Izumo sighed. "That's second day in a row, you don't love us anymore." he teased half-seriously. "But we will. Don't worry." He grinned.

"Heh. I still love you, don't you dare to underestimate my feelings." Iruka declared dramatically. "As a proof of my undying love, you can take Hatake with you, instead of me. He will keep you company."

"..." Kakashi raised an eyebrow.

"..." Mizuki blinked in a surprise.

"..." Izumo looked somewhere between being scared and disgusted.

"..." Anko laughed.

"It's actually a good idea.." Hayate titled his head and smiled. He had known his best friend for a while, so he knew that he wouldn't offer it, if he didn't think it will work out.

He was, after all, Ibiki's resident strategist.

* * *

><p><strong>Maa, that's it. Be nice and review. :P<strong>

**Good night, and - hopefully - see you tomorrow (I almost didn't make it today, my apologies -.-").  
><strong>


	17. Chapter 17

**Good lately evening. :) More like, good early night.**

**Another chapter, just for you ;)  
><strong>

* * *

><p>17<p>

The rest of the day went in a slow but calm pace. The sun was slowly settling down in a crook of two hills.

Iruka smiled when he reached the top of Hokage monument. He could already see his friends, who was just being lazy there. He chuckled upon seeing Kakashi still with them, sprawled above Minato-sama's left ear reading his little book and Anko trying to read it over his shoulders. The copy-nin looked like having the time of his life 'accidentally' moving the novel out of her sight every time.

"Hi!" Iruka called out and sat down next to Hayate, who had been chatting with Kotetsu animatedly.

"Yo." Kakashi eye-smiled on him and closed his book.

"Hello." Anko answered with a grin, while Hayate just poked him. "You are late." he said.

"Eeh, sorry 'bout that." Iruka scratched his scar. "Was helping Ibi-sama to sort some papers.. It's so booooring you wouldn't believe.."

"That's why _you_ do it, and not me." Hayate chuckled.

"Well.." Iruka laughed. "How was the evening, anyway? Did I miss anything?" he was curious how had Hatake managed to survive his other friends.

"Nah.. not at all.. Just Mizumizu was being an ass and Izuizu took him home." Kotetsu answered lazily stretching his arms.

Iruka frowned in concern – he knew that Mizuki could be really difficult, but he knew he was a nice guy. "What did he do?" he asked.

The three of them – minus Kakashi – exchanged looks. "He kinda told Hatake, that he doesn't want to .. _babysit _him." Anko took the liberty of answering, sending wary looks towards Iruka.

"Eh.. I see.." Iruka said sheepishly. "Guess it's my bad, I am sorry about it, Kakashi-san."

"Maa, it's alright.." Kakashi waved his hand dismissively. "It doesn't bother me, I am not a child." he smiled in a way which made all of the others wonder if he had meant it as an insult.

"Soo.. what did Ibiki-sama say?" Hayate asked and leaned comfortably against a strand of Yondaime's hair.

"Ah! Thanks for asking, I would've forgotten..." Iruka straightened his back. "I believe he said: 'Brat. Tomorrow, six. Six-morning.' Or something along those lines." Both of the Ibiki's genin laughed and soon enough the others joined them, little hesitant about making fun of the scariest man in the Konoha.

* * *

><p>"What is <em>that<em> one..?" Iruka asked softly, laying on his back in between Hayate and Kakashi.

"That's Great Bear." Hatake answered smugly and Hayate started giggling. Iruka elbowed him and gave him a questioning look.

"Eh.. ehehe. Didn't know.. _he_ has .. own bloody.. constellation." Hayate forced out in between giggles. Iruka blinked before he remembered that in their first year of being Ibiki-sama's genin, they had started calling him Big Bear, changing it to Great, after they had started respecting him.

"Haven't either.." Iruka laughed.

"What's so funny?" Hatake asked with amused expression.

"...Don't try to understand, Hatake-san.." Anko yawned – those two idiots had awoken her – and looked on her left, where Kotetsu was still snoring softly. "If you don't get it, it's probably one of their 'Ibiki-sama jokes', so don't even ask." she said bored and send Iruka with Hayate into another fit of laugher. She poked Hayate under his ribs, since he was laying just next to her.

Kakashi gave them a look. "I was trying to educate you, _brats. _But you are dishonoring my lessons."

Iruka wiped out a lonely tear from his cheek and forced himself to calm down. "S-sorry, Kakashi-san. Please continue?" he asked with puppy-dog's eyes and Kakashi faked thinking about it.

"Well... 'cause you asked so nicely.." He eye-smiled and looked back to the skies, pointing towards a group of stars. "If you take the last two stars from the Big Dipper – I showed that one to you, remember? - and estimate the distance between them, then prolong the imaginary line five times, you should see a really bright star."

"Ee..? Ah! I see it!" Iruka cheered and Hayate smacked him over head.

"Me too, baka. But I don't feel the need to shout it to the whole Konoha."

Kakashi chuckled. "The star is called North Star, or Aurora, because it point the way to north. Mostly the mariners use it. And Aurora because it can be seen really early to the night, and stays visible even in the morning."

The boys looked at the star with a new respect while Anko fell back into light sleep.

"I wonder.." Hayate whispered, his voice somehow in a harmony with the softness of early night at the edge of forest. "..If you are bluffing and trying to look smart... or just enjoy being lazy with your nose stuck in a book." he said towards Hatake exploiting the fact that if Kakashi wanted to hit him, he would have to do it over Iruka.

"Nah.." Kakashi offered not even bothering to open his eyes. "I am genius, I don't need to bluff, neither to study." he grinned at the angry outtake of a breath he got from the older genin and silent laugh from the other.

"Well then.. _genius-sama.._" Hayate frowned and leaned up on his elbow to get a look at the copy-nin. "Find me the _Southern Cross_." he challenged and smirked wickedly.

Kakashi remained silent with closed eyes. Hayate breathed in to talk after a moment of silence, when Kakashi said:

"Sorry.. wrong hemisphere.."

"..."

"Heh. He got it right." Iruka pointed out with a smile.

"Maa, I told you I am a genius." Kakashi smiled and rolled over to dodge when Hayate leaned over Iruka and tried to hit him.

"Sorry to interrupt, loverbirds.. I think it's time to go home." Anko said and sat up sleepily. She remembered she still had to do the dishes at home, and if she wanted to get some sleep and still be able to go training in the morning, she would have to go. She didn't like the idea of training with other kids, they would just make fun of her.

Kakashi looked up and sighed. It had gotten late, and he had a mission the next day. "I guess.." he mumbled and stood up watching as Anko not really gently shook Kotetsu to wake him up.

"I will stay for a while longer." Iruka said when all of them stood up, leaving him the only one unmoved. "I am not in a hurry."

Hayate sighed. "Alright, but don't oversleep tomorrow." he smiled lightly.

"Nah, that's more of your focus. Night, kids."

"Who's kid for you? I am your three-years senior." Hatake stuck his tongue rather childishly.

"Oh, sorry. G'night, kids, _grandpa_." Iruka laughed and closed his eyes listening to their retrieving steps and their bids of good night.

He rather enjoyed being out at night. The city was so silent and loud at the same time, more alive than trough the day in some way, whispering it's soothing words to him.

Yes, he knew it was dangerous for a _kid_ his age to wander around Konoha at night all alone, but he wasn't afraid.

He was, after all, Ibiki's warrior.

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><p><strong>Hope you enjoyed. :) <strong>

**Any comments? Questions? I would be more than glad to read whatever you want to tell me. :P**

**See you, bye.  
><strong>


	18. Chapter 18

**Hi :) Glad to see me again? :D i guess not.**

**Maa, back to 'Dear-Diaring' you. We were cleaning our Tatami to take off of them the dried blood today. :D Sounds as if we had been doing something really brutal on them, right? :D It was fun ^^**

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><p>18<p>

Hayate forced himself to roll off of his bed, hoping the fall would wake him up. It didn't, the landing did.

"Ouch." he muttered after rubbing his head to stop it from hurting. "Am not gonna thank you, 'Biki-sama.." he added and stood up to find something he could wear.

He threw away pants and shirt covered in dried blood and another pair which looked like took out from a cow's muzzle. Finally he found a black trousers at least _looking_ clean and just a little bit torn shirt.

_I guess I should give the bloody clothes to mum, but she's going to have a fit. _Hayate rubbed the bridge of his nose and exited his room. He took a glance at a large clock in the hallway.

"Heh. I _am_ late after all." he chuckled humorlessly and sprinted out of his house, slowing down just to slip on his shoes and grab a sweatshirt, thinking along the ways of 'If I didn't have it, it would rain. 'Cause I do, it won't.'

* * *

><p><em>I wonder if Haya-chan is late again..<em> Iruka chuckled and took a look around from his spot on the forest path they both take everyday. He had been waiting for his teammate for almost twenty minutes now.

The genin sighed. _Looks like we _will_ be late, after all.. Ibi-sama won't be happy. But at least we will be late _both_, so we will take his wright together._ He chuckled dryly and stretched his arms.

* * *

><p>"Aaah! Sorry, I am sorry." Hayate said trying to catch his breath when he reached his friend. <em>Iruka was waiting for me? Why? Does he want to be killed, <em>too_? _

Iruka just rolled his eyes and started jogging slowly, giving his friend enough time to catch up to him. "Let's hurry up, I am too young to die."

"Aye, aye, General."

* * *

><p>"Heh, heh." Iruka tried to laugh, but didn't really manage, since he was panting. "We did it, we are on <em>time.<em>" he forced out and fell on his knees enjoying the feeling of being able to _breath_.

"Yeah.." Hayate fell down next to him breathing even harder than him – he hadn't have the pause Iruka had, after all. "But I think.. I died... somewhere... in the middle... of it." he chuckled tiredly and looked up just to face a raised eyebrow of his sensei.

"Heh. Fancy meeting you here, Ibi-sama." Iruka laughed cheekily and winked on Ibiki.

Morino sighed. "You know, you two are really good exercise on my patience." he informed them and decided to plop down in front of them, so that he wouldn't have to break his neck looking down. He had known them for some time now, to know that they weren't standing anytime soon.

"Glad to help." Hayate offered politely.

"... Alright." Ibiki started making his two genin open their eyes and watch him.

_Uh-oh. He's serious. That's going to hurt. _Iruka thought, but didn't comment.

"I am glad you decided to show up on time." the sensei praised them with a little smile. "And. We got a mission." he stopped for a moment letting his words to settle down. "Leaving this evening, it will take about two weeks."

"Woooow." Iruka breathed out. It was their fourth long-term mission at all. Having the interrogating specialist as their sensei had his cons and pros – for example, Ibiki was far too important for Konoha to be able to leave the village for longer time.

"Awesome." Hayate added and they exchanged happy looks. It was going to be _exciting_.

Ibiki secretly smiled, their happiness rubbing on him. And what more, he got to have a holiday.

"So for today, you are free to do whatever you want. No training. You can study those scrolls I gave you, but I recommend resting. You will need your energy." Ibiki informed them and stood up to leave again. He still had work to do. Paperwork, mostly.

"Sounds nice. I will help you with the paperwork?" Iruka offered and stretched his arm towards Ibiki, asking him to help him up. Not like he needed it, it was just too much fun trying to pull his sensei down.

"Good." Ibiki agreed and pulled him up, and even more up, holding him about fifteen centimeters above ground.

"Meh, you going to carry me Ibi-sama?" Iruka asked wickedly and tried to kick the man. Ibiki dodged.

"Nah. I am going to throw you. Maybe, if I do it strongly enough, you will fly straight to my office." Ibiki cracked a joke, sending Iruka with Hayate into laughing fit.

"Ne.. Biki-sama, it wasn't funny." Hayate told him seriously, holding back his laugh.

"Than why are you laughing, brat." the sensei finally freed his genin, letting him fall down into semi-crouch gracefully.

"That's 'cause it's your first joke in this season." Hayate rolled his eyes and stood up, too. He decided he could as well go to join the other trio and then visit Minato-sama, while Iruka will be trying to bury himself under paperwork.

"Whatever." Ibiki grunted and turned to leave, starting his usual hard pace, forcing Iruka to jog occasionally to keep up with him. Hayate waved on them, taking the other path towards the river.

* * *

><p>"What's with you two calling me like this." Ibiki asked, making the question sound more like a demand, when they were alone. Iruka looked up at him and shrugged.<p>

"Donno." he mumbled. What could he say? That they _really _looked up to him? He wouldn't take it, the Ibiki he knew didn't consider himself a good person.

Iruka could feel the older one watching him carefully and forced his features into calm, relaxed mask. He made sure for the calmness to reach his eyes and double-checked that his fingers didn't twich. He had been practising it since he got to be Ibiki's genin - the jounin had been able to look just trough him.

"Ne, Ibi-sama." Iruka suddenly remembered he wanted to ask something.

Ibiki grunted as a sign he listened.

_How to say it.. well.. best would be to put it bluntly.. but.. to hell with it._ "You are really talkative, today. How come?" Iruka shoot out and mentally face-palmed. _Damned coward._

"That's not what you wanted to ask." Ibiki pointed out.

"Heh. Guess you know me – _us –_ too good." Iruka chuckled nervously. "Well.. I wanted to ask.. if.. well.. you know how we are a three-person team, right?"

Morino raised an eyebrow.

"Of course you know. Stupid me." Ibiki's silence didn't help to put Umino into ease. "Could we find the third teammate, soon?" _Still not what I wanted to ask._

Ibiki sighed. "Of course. Since you are asking, I assume you have someone on your mind." he stated.

"Mitarashi Anko." Iruka bit his lip.

"..."

The torture specialist thanked his training that he hadn't frozen. The only sigh showing his confusion and slight panic was a light frown on his forehead.

"I will ask the higher-ups." Ibiki said finally, knowing as well as Iruka that they won't oppose. Since it was Morino Ibiki who asked, there wouldn't be any problem.

* * *

><p><em>Still training<em>. Hayate sighed after sitting for a good hour on the Shodaime's head. He hadn't wanted to bother Minato-sama, yet.

_Let's see how are the other teams training._ He chuckled wickedly and slid down onto the Hokage's nose, pushing chakra into his feet and walking down. He stepped over the man's mouth and hang himself upside-down to climb his chin and neck.

"Still funny." he commented to himself. "Even though I have been doing this for almost three years, it's still funny as hell."

Hayate was still laughing when he stood on the ground.

"What's funny?" deep voice asked him and Hayate started. He turned briskly left touching his kunai pouch. He didn't take any weapon out - he was inside of his village, and the person didn't want to kill him – if they had wanted, he would have been dead already.

"Maa.. nothing at all.. nothing at all.." he mumbled and raised his arm to greet the young jounin, who was standing there looking bored. "Shiranui.. was it, right?" Hayate asked to make sure.

"Yup. You're Gekkou. Gekkou Hayate."

"Yes..." Hayate took a look around, trying to find something to say. "Eh, nice seeing you again?"

"Why so unsure?" Genma chuckled before answering with his own question. Hayate shrugged.

"Well.. did you like.. need something? Not like I have anything to do right now, but this is little bit awkward." Hayate commented bluntly, making the jounin laugh.

"Nah. Nothing at all. But since you are here, I have a question." Genma titled his head.

"Shoot."

"You two – you and that brat Umino – are genin under Morino Ibiki, right?" the jounin made sure.

Hayate nodded, trying to guess where Genma was going.

"What is he teaching you?" Shiranui shook his head and frowned while he asked. That was bothering him for some time, already.

Hayate blinked. That wasn't what he had been expecting. "What do you mean? Just.. normal things? To fight, defend, do jutsu.. What else should he?"

Genma sighed. He didn't know if he should believe the little genin or not. The opinion that Ibiki had been forming his own little soldiers was pretty widespread, after all. He decided he didn't believe him.

"I guessed you would say so."

"..." Hayate raised an eyebrow in so much of an Ibiki-fashion, that it just strengthened Genma's decision.

"You are, after all, Ibiki's little toy."

* * *

><p><strong>I swear I didn't want to make Genma an ass. I like him too much to do it intentionally! Really! He is my most favourite character. I would like to be so epic and say: "He's the only reason why i watch Naruto", but it wouldn't be true. I don't watch Naruto. Stopped about Five months ago. Too bored.<strong>

**Anyaway. :) Hope you liked it, hope you enjoyed it. Hope you will give me something to enjoy, too, and review. **

**Byebye~  
><strong>


	19. Chapter 19

**Hello. I am little (b)itchy today. :/ No one told me _anything at all_. I feel rejected. :(**

**Well.. not to bore you to death, heres the number 19.**

* * *

><p>19<p>

_"I guessed you would say so."_

_ "..." Hayate raised an eyebrow in so much of an Ibiki-fashion, that it just strengthened his decision._

_ "You are, after all, Ibiki's little toy."_

Hayate turned his head oh so slowly and gave the jounin a serious look.

"What did you say?" he asked silently and Genma titled his head.

"Don't make me repeat myself." the jounin said in a bored voice and leaned closer to intimidate the smaller shinobi. "Isn't Morino training you to be his soldier?"

"No." Hayate stated frowning. This turn of event was really weird.

"You are lying." Genma spitted out with a nasty grin. "That man is a dangerous bastard. And Umino is growing to be just like him."

Hayate took a deep breath and tried to force his tensed muscles to calm down again.

"Shiranui. I am not going to hit you for _trying_ to insult my teammate." he whispered and closed his eyes. Genma blinked. "But I _am_ going to fucking hit you, for insulting my sensei!"

* * *

><p>Iruka leaned back on the high chair and ran his hand trough his sweaty hair. "Maa.. looks like it's all.." he yawned and scanned the room for any other paper, needing to be filled, sorted, burned or ate.<p>

Ibiki grunted his agreement and stood up from the other chair in the room. "Thank you, brat. I will walk you home." the sensei yawned himself and smacked Iruka over his head for rolling eyes.

"..'m not a kid.. can walk myself." Iruka muttered and pouted.

"I need to stretch my legs anyway, brat. So shut up." Ibiki said as they left the office, breathing the cold air in.

"I knew you would say that." Iruka laughed. "And it almost rhymed, you are a _poet_ Ibiki-sama!" he cheered and bounced on his feet.

"Whatever... Let's go trough the park, it's shorter."

"I thought you just wanted to 'stretch your legs'.. or was it 'scratch'?" Iruka mused and quickly ducked before Ibiki could hit him again.

"Funny... Not."

"Sooo sorry, Ibi-sama." Iruka grinned. "Hey, ain't it Haya-chan? I feel his chakra.." he frowned and changed his way towards the source.

* * *

><p>Hayate aimed his balled fist on the jounin's cheek and missed – the jounin had stepped aside, looking rather worried. However, Hayate was prepared for it, and hooked his leg behind Genma's knee and pulled, tripping him down.<p>

"Ugh.." Genma gasped for breath as his back hit the ground. He wasn't thinking clearly and gripped the first thing he could – Hayate's shirt. The genin felt down on top of him and managed to get a hit on his chin.

"Stop it, kid!" the jounin yelled and tried to move from under the furious boy.

Hayate didn't answer, just landed another hit, strong enough to break something even, but Genma strengthened the part of his skin with chakra. He tried to kick the kid off, but only managed to give him more face and Hayate thanked him with a knee in his stomach.

"Stop it." he breathed out again and contemplated using force. He didn't want to get _hurt_, thank you very much. Hayata ignored him.

"C'moon. Calm down!" Genma ordered and managed to roll them over and pin the other's arms and legs. Hayate fought back.

"What's going on?" Genma tensed as he heard calm deep voice he knew so well. He stood up and took a step away from the genin, not really trusting him to calm down.

"Nothing at all, Morino-san." Genma said silently and looked away. He didn't want to see the torture specialist, it would bring back memories, memories he didn't want to have.

".. You are young Shiranui.." Ibiki mumbled silently recognizing the proud teen. He remembered the case with the jounin's family. It wasn't pleasant.

When the jounin stayed silent, he turned to his panting genin. Hayate hadn't stood up yet and Iruka was looking at him with concern.

"Stand up, Hayate." Ibiki said and rubbed the bridge of his nose. Hayate obeyed immediately, looking down respectfully. "Iruka, go look at Shiranui and see his wounds." Iruka nodded.

"C'mmon." the long-haired genin told the jounin and tugged on his sleeve to leave the area. If Ibiki wanted to speak with Hayate _alone_, it wasn't his place to oppose. It worked both ways, the two of them were best friends, teammates and what-not, but neither would go against their sensei.

"Hayate." Ibiki said slowly, forcing the young genin to look up. "What did I tell you this morning?" he asked sternly looking straight to the dark brown eyes.

"Ibiki-sama, you said we are to .. rest for the upcoming mission." Hayate said in a monotone.

"Then why were you fighting?" Ibiki asked.

"I am sorry about it, Ibiki-sama." the boy whispered, but didn't get a reply. _Figures, he didn't want me to apologize. _"I was fighting because of something Shiranui had said." he asnwered.

"Is that all?" Ibiki raised his eyebrow and when he got just a nod as an answer, he added: "I will not ask you, what did he say, since you clearly don't want to share it. But I will say _one_ thing." he paused and Hayate looked at him in something between fear and curiosity.

"I am not angry because of the fight. If you want to fight, than it's acceptable. If someone insult you, or someone dear to you, it's the only permissible thing to do." Ibiki stopped for a moment, looking sharply at the genin. "However, I am disappointed in the way you just decided to ignore what I said. I am considering canceling the mission, since you won't have enough energy." Hayate looked up in a panic. "I am not going to do so." Ibiki informed him and he sighed in a relief. "I need a holiday. You are to think about it. And go sleep to Iruka, I don't want you to be late again."

Hayate nodded and stayed silent, as he still didn't believe his voice. He watched the back of his sensei as he walked away, not even turning around, as he would have, if he had been in a good mood.

_I am so sorry, Ibiki-sama._ Hayate choked down his sobs and turned around to go and find his teammate.

_I am not going to disobey your order. Never-ever again. _He sighed and rubbed his eyes and added out loud:

"I am, after all your subordinate."

* * *

><p><strong>well, hope you liked it, and all this things. <strong>

**bye.  
><strong>


	20. Chapter 20

**Good late evening from the middle of E. :)**

* * *

><p>20<p>

The owl, sent with an urgent letter to the interrogation specialist, found him and the rest of Team Ibiki hiding comfortably in a thorny bush, shivering from early morning cold.

"Eh. Owl." Iruka said intelligently, his half-awoken brain wasn't yet able to comprehend how could the animal got from Konoha to the _Hideous Hidden Horrible Forest_, as he called the area where they had been spending their last week, trying to get as much information about the monks, as possible.

"I can see that." Ibiki informed him, in case Iruka hadn't noticed. "Go get it, brat."

Iruka shakily stood up on his frozen legs and jogged closer to the path. The forest was dark and the only thing talking resembling civilization was the muddy path, so he didn't really bother with hiding his presence. He heard the sound of wind crashing against soft wings even before he saw the owl flying towards him. It's claws were sharp and it almost cut his skin trough the leather wrist-protector.

"Maa.. aren't you a cute thing.." he mumbled soothingly, eying the letter attached to it's leg with a wary look. "And you would be even cuter, if I was sure you aren't carrying the order to get our asses back.." the owl looked at him with large, intelligent eyes and hooked in an apologetic way. _Or I am just too tired._

"Here. It has a letter." Iruka announced and plopped back on the spot of deeply frozen forest ground where he had previously warmed to at least survivable temperature.

Ibiki grunted his 'thank you' and unsealed the letter rolling it open and quickly scanning the tiny penmanship. He sighed and his face fell in something akin to sadness.

"Well, brats. We are going home, our mission is officially over."

"What about the information?" Hayate asked sleepily.

"We got enough information to totally destroy them in one attack. It's over." Ibiki said silently, hoping that what he said to calm his brats was true. "We are leaving in an hour, say 'bye' to the forest, you will not be seeing outsides of Konoha anytime soon." The interrogator's voice was regretful.

* * *

><p>Anko rolled on her back, watching the setting sun. "I wonder when are they coming home.." she whispered and closed her eyes, just listening to the sounds of Konoha, trying to recognize the silent footsteps heading towards her from the forest.<p>

_It's probably Izumo with Kotetsu, or Mizuki_.

* * *

><p>"Home, sweet <em>home<em>." Iruka said feeling suddenly down. "It's _nice_ being back in Konoha, damnit."

"Nah, it's _weird_ being back in Konoha." Hayate opposed and took a look around to see that nothing had changed.

"Uhm-m. It's _stupid_ being back in Konoha." Iruka exclaimed again cracking his neck.

"Well, and it's almost _irritating_ being back in Konoha." Hayate added again.

"Humiliating even."

"Annoying, I would add."

"Tiresome?"

"Yea.. and boring."

"Awful."

"..and terrible."

"And what more, it's troublesome."

"I second that, and it's actually-" Hayate was interrupted by Ibiki:

"Shut it, brats. Go take a bath, you stink."

"..." Hayate looked at him funny before signing in resigned way.

"You are tactful as usual, Ibi-sama." Iruka laughed. "But we shall obey your orders, Sir-Sensei-Sir!"

"Yeah, yeah. Just go." he waved them off, and turned away himself, to take a quick shower before going to have his 'tea' with the Hokage. "Before I forget!" he shouted over his shoulder. "You three are signed to the Chuunin exam, go find the girl and train."

* * *

><p>"Shower~ The most awesome invention from the beginning of human race! I feel like <em>singing<em>." Iruka exclaimed happily and enjoyed the warm water caressing his frozen skin.

"Don't. Please, don't." Hayate laughed from where he was sitting outside of the bathroom, already clean and reading some scroll. He was leaning against the door, waiting for his friend to finish.

"You know, you could just go to the bedroom or kitchen or something." Iruka answered and Hayate just _knew_, he was pouting in the silly way of his.

"Nah.. I will wait." the smaller genin said and rested his head against the wooden door.

"You know.." Iruka said as he started drying himself. "They call it 'after-mission solidarity'. The aversion of leaving your teammates." he mused out loud.

"Well, genius, why's that?" Hayate asked uninterestedly, but knowing Iruka wouldn't shut up anyway.

"It's 'cause we were together for about one week, protecting each other and watching each other's back. If you were alone, you wouldn't sleep this night, feeling insecure. It's like short-time paranoia." Iruka chuckled.

"If you say so.." Hayate returned back to the sword-techniques from series called stupidly 'Body-Light Techniques'.

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><p>"I heard those two idiots are back." Izumo said and sat down next to the silent girl. Anko looked up suddenly feeling the urge to smile. She grinned instead.<p>

"Good." she said and turned her head back towards the lazy village.

"They are probably going to clean themselves and go visit Yondi-sama." Kotetsu added and stood at the precipice of Sandaime's head, where Anko had been sitting for almost three hours straight, reading a book.

"So we will be having them here in about.. hmm.. ten minutes?" Mizuki titled his head and laid down savoring the feeling of sun-shine.

"Why do you think it's gonna be ten?" Kotetsu asked curiously, because he would have guessed about hour or so.

"Well.. I assumed it, considering the direction and speed of wind, our current season and the night temperature in south Europa. I multiplied it with the number of people having lunch right now and divided with the number of your braincells which died because of you thinking about this." Mizuki said with a roll of his eyes. "That, and because they are walking over there." he pointed towards the riverbank he could see from his spot on Sandaime's head.

"..." Kotetsu looked at him dumbfounded and Anko laughed.

"Thank you." the girl said and closed her eyes, smiling. She was looking forward seeing them again, even though she knew it was good for them to have a little trip outside of the borders of Konoha.

After all, they were Ibiki's fellow prisoners of the Village.

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><p><strong>Hope you liked it. <strong>

**I will try to post it here tomorrow, if just for the fact that its going to be the last chapter, the next one. :) So bear with me for one more day.**

**Good night.  
><strong>


	21. Chapter 21

**Hi, hi. The project is officialy over. :) I had wanted to try and write everyday one chapter, so I would get better in English, as well as fight my lazyness. Dont laugh, its not funny. :D I managed to do just as I wanted, aside of _two_ days. That means this story is now 21 chapters old, as well as 23 days.**

**Thank you for staying with me.  
><strong>

**If you spot some ugly mistake, let me know so I can correct it, thank you.**

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><p>21<p>

"Hyia, folks!" Kotetsu said and turned his head towards two figures, lazily waving his hand.

"Hello, kids." Iruka grinned and ran the remaining distance onto the third's head. "How were you?" he asked and sat down, making a place for Hayate to join him.

"Booored. You know it." Izumo waved his hand in a dismissive manner. "How was your mission?"

"Interrupted." Hayate rolled his eyes and slid down next to his teammate. "And cold."

"Maa.. sounds _really_ exciting." Mizuki chuckled. Iruka hit his shoulder.

"Yeah, before I forget. Ibi-sama is letting us take the exam this year." Iruka added thoughtful.

"..'s that so? Not fair, you will be chuunin before me!" Kotetsu exclaimed in mock horror.

"How come? You need to be three-person team to attend." Izumo frowned. That is basically how he had ended in a team with Kotetsu and Mizuki – they had attended about three times, each with their team, and they didn't pass the last part. Because of that, they had been put into a new team.

"Yeah.. That's right, genius." Hayate laughed. "And that's why, we are now announcing our bright _new_ teammate." he stopped dramatically and let Iruka finish it.

The long-haired teen stood up and bowed to his stunned friends, before kneeling in front of the only girl in group. "Mitarashi Anko. Will you grace me with your agreement and became my teammate?" he asked and took her hand in his, "I am afraid I lost the ring somewhere, though." he titled his head and frowned.

"...Well... I .. Anno.." Anko tried, bud didn't really know what to say.

"Anyway, you will have to became a teammate both of mine, and Hayate's, so I will give you about .. seven seconds to think about it." he nodded seriously before exchanging wicked look with his friend.

"Wait-wait-wait-wait!" Mizuki interrupted whatever had Anko tried to say this time. "You can't just go around and pick up someone to your team! The Hokage chooses the teams!"

"I know that, dear Mizuki. That's why we got an agreement out of Biki-sama first." Hayate rolled his eyes. "You are such a nerd, really."

"Am not." Mizuki sulked.

"Are too!" Hayate grinned evilly.

"No, no. I can't hear you!" the white-haired genin raised his hands and cupped his ears, making a tut-ing sounds. Hayate laughed.

"..I accept.. Eh.. your _proposal_, my _dear_... teammate." Anko said loudly to calm them both down and grinned her own cheeky grin.

"Good." Iruka nodded and started an applause.

* * *

><p>The sun was almost setting, again. She had spent so much hours up there, that it was a common sight for her eyes, however this time it was different. She was a part of team. She had friends, and even thought she didn't feel being an actual part of their <em>gang<em>, she felt content.

"I think it's time for her _entrance test_." Izumo mused out loud, as if reading her mind.

"You mean.. _that_?" Hayate asked hesitantly.

"Yeah.. it's about time, with all the teammate-thing.. don'cha think?"

The rest murmured their agreement, leaving Anko confused. _Which test? What should she do to pass? Was it like _his_ tests? Should she do it?_

"Mitarashi Anko!" Izumo said suddenly, taking the lead of their test.

"..yes?" she said silently, when she got the feeling it was what he wanted to hear.

"Do you desire to be a part of the Lost Children?" the honey-haired genin asked another question, hoping the girl won't ask about the name. They had thought it up a long time ago and it had lost it's original meaning.

"Yes." Anko nodded not really knowing what to do. _The best thing to do in these kind of situations is just let the stream take you and pray. Too bad I don't have anything and neither anyone to pray to._

"Are you willing to share your sadness as well as happiness with the others and let them share with you?" Iruka threw a weird look towards his smallest friend, wondering where he had gotten that phrase. Had he been attending some wedding or something?

"Yes, I am." Anko said, already feeling stupid about saying 'yes' over and over again.

"And are you willing to sacrifice your everything, as well as your life if the need arise?"

Anko hesitated. Her loyalty laid in Konoha, but at the same time, they didn't tell her anything about having to turn back on the village. "Yes." she said again.

"Are you willing to sacrifice your life?" Izumo repeated with a silent frown, wanting – no, needing – to be sure.

"Yes, I am." Anko whispered and smiled a tiny smile, closing her eyes. Because of that, she didn't see Kotetsu and Iruka move, one towards her, the second towards the cliff. She didn't see the wicked light in Izumo's and Hayate's eyes, neither did she see the snaky smile of Mizuki.

Kotetsu's palm collided with her stomach and she gasped for breath, stumbling back. Her eyes shot open, but didn't really see anything – panic devoured her, as she stepped into emptiness.

"What-" she tried to say something and leaned forward to take a hold of the rock, but another pair of arms caught her, and threw her back.

She felt.

Anko closed her eyes, tear threatened to escape to her cheek, but she didn't give it freedom. She didn't want to cry the last thing in her life.

Neither did she want to think about what happened – she didn't want to _hate_ them. They acted as her friends and gave her hope – so what they just wanted to get rid of her, she had been happy.

_Thank you. _She said without words and a content smile appeared on her face, as she was falling. It was only few meters to the ground.

Only few meters to her death. And only few seconds to the journey to hell.

Anko fell the need to laugh as she prepared for the pain.

Her body jerked and stopped, the sudden absence of movement alarming and horrifying.

_I am alive. Or am I?_

Anko didn't open her eyes, waiting for the pain of having her body thoroughly crushed, but it didn't come. Actually, aside of the light wind and something softly tugging on her wrists, stomach and ankles, she didn't feel anything.

However, when she heard the deep laugh, she opened her eyes. What she saw was surprising – Iruka was hovering in the air just a meter above her, holding something she didn't recognize. She didn't see it clearly.

"What happened?" Anko asked more calmly, than she felt.

"We call it a 'free-fall'. You fall down, and just a short distance from the ground I tug on the chakra wire, to stop you. I have your wires attached to myself, and I am attached to one other, which leads up to the middle of monument. We do it quite often." he said uninterestedly, as if it was absolutely normal, and Anko got the sudden urge to hit him.

"Just punch him, I do it often enough." Anko heard Hayate said and looked around to see the genin standing upright on the rock.

"Don't listen to him, I don't like when someone hits me!" Iruka opposed and loosened the wires so that Anko would be able to stand on the ground. She sat down immediately, fighting the sudden nausea.

Iruka felt down next to her with a loud thump and just laid there, breathing heavily.

"You shouldn't have done it so soon after a mission.." Mizuki scolded him when he, too, stepped down from the rock, dismissing the chakra from his feet.

"Wasn't my idea." Iruka answered and willed his head to stop rotating his sense of sight.

Izumo stood next to them and gave Anko a smile. "Welcome to our _gang_." he informed her. "You passed the test."

Anko wanted to ask what was the test about it, because she didn't really feel she had had any say in it, but didn't. She also wanted to hit Iruka, but didn't do it either. He looked almost as sick as she felt.

However, when she looked around, what she saw surprised her even more – all of the genin were smiling warmly. They had accepted her.

And when Hayate started laughing on the face Iruka unconsciously made, followed by a weak laugh from the long-haired genin, she knew that it will be alright. Everything will be alright.

They were, after all, Ibiki's team.

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><p><strong>Soo.. who thouth they were trying to kill her? And who suspected it was a bluff on my side?<strong>

**:) Anyway, I am glad I met you, now is time to say my farewell. :)**

**This was the last chapter, I hope you liked the story as much as I liked writting it.**

**Bye, Sharina.  
><strong>


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